The Skinny June 2009 by The Skinny

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ISSUE 45•JUNE 2009•

REVENGE ! OF T HE

MONST ER FILM

EXCESS

! E S I NO

! S U PL

R J R U A S DINO ORBITAL A P P A Z L I Z DWEE

F EST! EDINBUR GH INT ER FILM F ES NATIONAL TIVAL

OUS T I U T A R G

! E R O G

SORDID

! S L I A T DE

ROGER CORMAN ... KING OF THE Bs! SHANE MEADOWS, GOES BUDGET (AGAIN!) ALL TOMORROW S PARTIES ... THE FILM! AND BONDAGE... UNDER THE RADAR!

WE INTERVIEW ALL THREE BAIRNOSAURS! REGULAR GUYS WITH TORCHES FOR EYES! SUMMONS THE GHOST OF HIS PA!

PLACEBO BATTLE FOR THE SUN

THE NEW ALBUM

08.06.09 FEATURES THE SiNgLES ‘FOR WHAT iT’S WORTH’ & ‘BATTLE FOR THE SUN’ LIVE: TUES 08 DEC - BIRMINGHAM LG ARENA | WED 09 DEC - LONDON THE O2 ARENA FRi 11 DEC - BRIDLINGTON SPA | SAT 12 DEC - MANCHESTER CENTRAL MON 14 DEC - GLASGOW SECC | TUES 15 DEC - DuBLIN THE OLyMPIA THEATRE www.gigsandtours.com | www.placeboworld.co.uk

the silencers

JUST ANNOUNCED

(Original Line-Up)

www.thesilencers.net

Glasgow Oran Mor Wednesday 15th July

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Wanda Jackson

BRANDI CARLILE

JUST ANNOUNCED

Plus Special Guests

GLASGOW ORAN MOR SAT 8TH AUG

Tuesday 23rd June Glasgow ABC2

0844 847 2363 www.abcglasgow.com

CROSBY STILLS & NASH SATURDAY 11 JULY

EDINBURGH CASTLE

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presents

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Editorial YOU can use an editorial for all sorts of things, from ranting to enthusing, inspiring to pretending you care about shit you blatantly don’t (not really The Skinny's style). This month I’m in practical mood, so will rather serve to preview a couple of brilliant-looking events that didn’t quite make it into the rest of the mag. The first is on Saturday 13th, at the Grosvenor cinema in Glasgow, where near-legendary publisher John Calder will be giving a talk alongside a screening of Samuel Beckett’s only film work, called, with typically confident lack of flair – Film (14.00, free). Although the film is by no means a masterpiece on a par with his theatrical or literary highpoints, it is a fascinating work with an equally fascinating backstory: Beckett was on set throughout, and the starring role was played by none other than Buster Keaton. Calder - who published authors including Beckett, influential Scottish troublemaker Alexander Trocchi, and who introduced the controversial William S Burroughs to the UK market, fighting for freedom of speech in the courts as he did so - is a great character in his own right, and a very good storyteller as well as an insightful commentator. Only a few days later, the unique and brilliant Throbbing Gristle arrive at Tramway for their first ever Scottish performance (17 June, 20.00, £20). Their recent tour of America was praised as a triumph (and featured a tour-exclusive CD on sale), and listening to recordings of live shows from their 70s heyday it’s clear they’ve always had a simultaneously full-on and yet subversive take on presenting themselves. If you’ve never heard of the band it’s hard to know what’ll sell you on attending, but I would comfortably put TG up there with Kraftwerk, Suicide, and Afrika Bambaataa as among the most influential early electronic music producers. Should be epic. Promoted by the ever imaginative Optimo, the event also features a DJ set from internationally-celebrated visual artist Cerith Wyn Evans, ahead of his coming display at Tramway later this year. He already has a show on at Inverleith House in Edinburgh, highlighted in our Art section on page 32. There are all kinds of festivals on this month, and we’re

Issue 45, June 2009 © Radge Media Ltd. Cover Illustation: David Lemm

ESTS

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THURSDAY 16 JULY

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SATURDAY 19TH SEPTEMBER GLASGOW ABC 0844 847 2363 www.abcglasgow.com

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0871 220 0260 or from ABC Box Office: Glasgow, Ticket Scotland: Argyle St Glasgow, Rose St Edinburgh & Ripping Records.

4 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

rupert@theskinny.co.uk

THE SKINNY June 2009

PLUS CHUCK PROPHET

GLASGOW ABC TUES 14TH JULY

covering as many as we can. The West End Festival, Leith Festival, and Kelburn Garden Party all get a mention (from page 6). The Edinburgh International Film Festival has all the stars, with Maggie Gyllenhaal, Gael García Bernal, and Sir Sean Connery all expected in town for the event. However, we take a look at the more ‘budget’ side to this year’s programme with our B-movie-tastic feature on page 8. Altogether more of a wild one, Rock Ness has half The Skinny team flexing their rave muscles in anticipation. The line-up is more balanced than previous years though, with Flaming Lips, Super Furries and Steve Mason all providing attractive psychedelic vibes to complement the euphoric highs that’ll greet much the line-up (we have a word with both Gruff Rhys and Mason on page 34). Of the dance acts, there’s a wealth of big-time talent to choose from, from April cover-stars The Prodigy, Basement Jaxx – whose new single Raindrops is a Gang Gang Dance gone pop-like return to form – and the livemagicians Orbital. We interview these latter on page 44, and Barcelona-residing Glaswegian techno meist Funk D’Void on page 57 (he’s also playing the festival, along with a full host of Soma-stable beatmakers. It’s always nice when people relax a bit. A good example of this was on the homepage of the Rock Ness site where for a while, they were running a classic clip of Orbital playing Chime at Glastonbury. Who cares that Glasto is nominally a ‘rival’ event? Of course people have played great sets there; and this vid only served to support the idea that Orbital are going to tear it up in the Highlands this month. But there are plenty of people who would balk at that kind of ‘off-brand’ promotional activity. One of the voices to the contrary, a man who favours collaboration, leadership and 'doing right' as core tenets of his business, is Seth Godin, the influential American whose blog I have previously recommended here. Recently I interviewed him, and heard what he had to say about taking the initiative during challenging times. That piece launches our new ‘Digital’ section, found on page 20. I’ve saved the bragging ‘til the end, but be sure to check out our spangly new website design (with all sorts of handy new features on top of the stylistic tweakery) at www.theskinny.co.uk. Seriously now, if websites were cars, ours would be K.I.T.T. off of Knightrider.

E: hello@theskinny.co.uk T: 0131 467 4630 P: The Skinny, The Drill Hall, 30-38 Dalmeny St, Edinburgh, EH6 8RG The Skinny is Scotland's largest independent entertainment & listings magazine, and offers a wide range of advertising packages and affordable ways to promote your business. Get in touch to find out more.

Publisher Editorial

Editor Online & Music editor Clubs editor Deviance editor Theatre editor Film editor DVD editor Comedy editor Reading editor Games editor Art & Showcase editor Food & Drink editor Aberdeen editor

Sophie Kyle Rupert Thomson Dave Kerr Chris Duncan Nine Gareth K. Vile Gail Tolley Michael Gillespie Lizzie Cass-Maran Keir Hind Josh Wilson Rosamund West Ruth Marsh Jaco Justice

E: sales@theskinny.co.uk All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part without the explicit permission of the publisher. The views and opinions expressed within this publication do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the printer or the publisher.

Printed by Mortons Print Limited, Horncastle

Production

Creative director Production editor Designer Chief Subeditor Subeditors

ABC: 32,487 1/7/08 - 31/12/09

Sales

Enterprise manager

Research

Listings editor Clubs listings

Matt MacLeod David Lemm Mike Sterry Rosamund West Euan Ferguson Paul Greenwood Paul Mitchell Gillian Watson

Lara Moloney

Becca Pottinger Andrew Cooke

Contents

DF CONCERTS PRESENTS…DF CONCERTS PRESENTS…DF CONCERTS PRESENTS…

COVER FEATURE

The Monster Film Festival

Glasgow ABC

All sorts of B-movie, budget, experimental and other odd flicks descend on Edinburgh for the month. We report, keen.

Thursday 16th July

»8

6 10 12 16 18 20 22 24 28 31 32 34 54 59

Edinburgh HMV Picture House

Heads Up Looking forward to June festivals: West End (Glasgow), Leith (sort of near Edinburgh), and Kelburn Garden (er, Kelburn, near Largs).

GLASGOW BARROWLAND

Friday 30th October www.iamreverend.com

Wednesday 23rd September New albu ‘Grace/Wastelands’ out now. www.peterdohertymusic.com

Food and Drink

How to cook vegetables from the UK without making yourself miserable.

Fashion

Spectacular jewellery to make the night come alive (for you, not in general - that'd be far-out and a little too scary). Plus animal sweatshirts.

Deviance

Lindsay Thomas regrets the invisibility of being bi in a straight relationship, while Phoebe Henderson seeks young blood to satiate her needs.

Showcase

+ SPARROW AND THE WORKSHOP Plus Special Guests

GLASGOW KING TUTS

GLASGOW GARAGE

DUNDEE THE DOGHOUSE

FRIDAY 23RD OCTOBER

WEDNESDAY 3RD JUNE THURSDAY 4TH JUNE

The incredible debut album ‘Manners’ out now www.myspace.com/passionpitjams

THE MACCABEES PLUS GUESTS

Our pick of the Duncan of Jordanstone Degree Show: Jessica Ramm's multi-disciplinary work is kooky as a hippie mum's spider collection.

EDINBURGH REID HALL

Digital

An interview with internet marketing guru Seth Godin, and reviews of some feisty new games.

Reading

SATURDAY 20 TH JUNE

GLASGOW ABC

FRIDAY 9TH OCTOBER ALBUM ‘WALL OF ARMS’ OUT NOW INCLUDES THE SINGLES ‘LOVE YOU BETTER’ AND ‘NO KIND WORDS’ WWW.THEMACCABEES.CO.UK WWW.MYSPACE.COM/THEMACCABEES

Glasgow King Tuts

Interviews with James Kelman, Janice Galloway (left), Andrea McNicoll and Tom Pow, all winners at the Scottish Mortgage Trust book Awards.

Sunday 14th June

Film

Gail Tolley reports from Cannes, on the new Ken Loach film starring Eric Cantona (left), Looking for Eric, and on how horror is coming for us all.

www.myspace.com/raygunofficial www.marshall-arts.com

Debut single 'JUST BECAUSE' out 20th July

Comedy A look at some of the best acts performing at the Leith Festival this month, including Jojo Sutherland (left).

Art

A survey of this year's Dundee Degree Show, and a look ahead to the Annuale, on in Edinburgh throughout the month.

Glasgow King Tuts Sunday 28th June

KID HARPOON + CASSIDY GLASGOW THE HOLD AT THE ADMIRAL THURSDAY 11TH JUNE

Theatre

National Theatre of Scotland swoop in to make the already excellent Peer Gynt yet more pimp, and we get anticipatory over opera.

Malcolm Middleton

& THE PACEMAKERS STICKS ‘N’ STONES TOUR

Aberdeen Moshulu

WED 17th JUNE

Edinburgh Studio 24

THU 18th JUNE

www.myspace.com/jamietwimbledon www.jamie-t.com

GLASGOW KING TUTS THURSDAY 11TH JUNE

Emilíana Torrini GLASGOW ORAN MOR

WEDNESDAY 24TH JUNE

Music

Dinosaur Jr are still on killer form, while another homegrown monster looms large: we speak to Orbital (left) about returning to rock, er, Ness.

Clubs

Techno hero Funk D'Void (left) also looks forward to Rock Ness, while Den Haan are just plain awesome (and ironic, and fun).

Listings

Screeds of information making the case for 'life' (in its ongoing psycho-spiritual battle with 'sofa'). Including full Leith Festival listings with comedian Tom Stade (left).

EDINBURGH BONGO CLUB Tuesday 16th June

GLASGOW THE ARCHES TUESDAY 30TH JUNE

WWW.SPEARHEADVIBRATIONS.COM

TICKETS 24HRS 08444 999 990 • www.ticketmaster.co.uk • www.gigsinscotland.com

IN PERSON GLASGOW Tickets Scotland, EDINBURGH Tickets Scotland, Ripping, DUNDEE Grouchos & all Ticketmaster Ticket Centres.

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 5

Heads Up

Top 5 West End Festival Events

Previews Glasgow West End Festival

1. Fête de la Musique, Ashton Lane, Sunday 21 June, 1pm-10pm, free entry The largest cultural event in the French calendar is celebrated in Ashton Lane this year. The event, for which musicians of all genres and calibres will play for free, is new to the West End but has been held in more than a hundred countries worldwide on the summer solstice, 21 June. It is open to any amateur or professional who wishes to perform. Already confirmed are Le Reno Amps, Injuns, Big Black Taxi and the Marco Cafolo Quartet. Venues include Brel, Vodka Wodka, Jinty McGuinty’s, The Ubiquitous Chip and The Grosvenor.

Kelvingrove Park, the Botanic Gardens, Byres Road 12-28 June 2009

The West End, Glasgow’s most fashionable address since the 1800s, may not be regarded as the best place to visit when in need of a cheap but entertaining day out. Though recognised for its free museums, and green areas including Kelvingrove Park, the area is considered relatively expensive with its high-priced boutiques on Byres Road and Ashton Lane’s fashionably cosy but costly pubs and restaurants. And after months of being subjected to endless headlines concerning the dreaded recession, most Glaswegians and tourists alike are taking care of every penny. Perhaps, however, we are too hasty to judge the West End as an area inaccessible to those with lighter pockets. Consider the West End Festival, one of Scotland’s most vibrant cultural festivals, which returns to Glasgow this year. Having attended the festival for the first time last year, I was pleasantly surprised by the number of free activities contributing to an array of musical, artistic, theatrical and literary events; a range which could rival the Edinburgh Fringe in terms of variety. The festival traditionally kicks off with the free Mardi Gras parade, which ran along Byres Road last year, but has this year been shortened and moved to a route through Kelvin Way. There has been some controversy surrounding the move, with traders on Byres Road claiming that funding from Glasgow City Council has been cut, and that the move will have a damaging effect on their profits. Reasons for the move are unclear but the parade is set to continue its tradition of a lively and colourful carnival of floats and performers culminating in Kelvingrove Park. Other cost effective events include the new Fête de la Musique, a free event where musicians of all genres can play in various venues in Ashton Lane, The Glasgow Mela, and the Gibson Street Gala. Chairman for the West End Festival Board, Liz Scobie believes no-one will be disappointed by the extensive line-up: “The West End Festival has been a huge success since it started. It’s an eclectic mix with something for everyone. The festival will bring the best in cultural entertainment and community spirit to residents of and visitors to Glasgow promising a great day out for all the family.” The festival runs from Friday 12 June to Sunday 28 June in venues across the West End, including Byres Road, Gibson Street, Great Western Road, Kelvingrove Park and the Botanic Gardens. [Claire Brunton]

Gutter Talk

cheeser

2. West End Indoor Art Market, Hillhead Library, Friday 26 June, 12pm-6pm The West End Indoor Art Market sees 35 selected artists from across the city selling art at a price that’s of value to the artist and the buyer. Free rickshaw rides are available from the Botanic Gardens to the art market. 3. The Taming of the Shrew, Botanic Gardens, 24-26 June, 7.45pm, £8-£15 One of Shakespeare’s most popular comedies takes to the main stage of Bard in the Botanics. The historic battle of the sexes is brought to life in a funny and touching production. 4. The Glasgow Mela, Kelvingrove Park, Sunday 21 June, 12pm, free The city’s biggest multi-cultural festival has gone from strength to strength, embracing the many cultures that make Scotland diverse. Music from bhangra to Russian folk is just part of an exciting programme of music and dance, puppet shows and visual art workshops. 5. Amnesty International’s Songwriting and Poetry workshop, Hillhead Library, Tuesday 16 June, 3pm, free Folk singer and songwriter Bella Hardy teams up with Amnesty International to host a songwriting and poetry workshop to mark Refugee Week. Participants have the opportunity to share their work at Amnesty’s Gathering on Thursday 18 June. For details visitwestendfestival.co.uk

Look who we found knocking around Knockengorroch Festival

fiona

george

lois

susie best thing about summer?

Best thing about summer?

Smell of freshly cut grass, glinting glass windows, travelling, festivals, light evenings.

Sunshine.

Gay cows.

Long warm evenings.

Daddy or chips?

Daddy.

Daddy

How many fags?

None.

Tiger or rabbit egg?

How many fags have you smoked here?

A tiger egg sauteed with a bit of rabbit.

They don't lay eggs. With an invisible frying pan.

Porridge?

Yup.

Creamy creamy nicey.

Last thing in your mouth?

A half ?

A fag.

I love you?

last thing in your mouth?

My daughter

Mum.

A wee sip of a tube.

Best thing about summer?

Gurning.

Outdoor parties and long days.

Daddy or chips?

Daddy.

Chips.

How many fags?

How many have you got?

20 - 30.

Are we talking the person or the sauce? Either way, both.

Tiger or rabbit egg?

How many fags?

Tiger egg powdered baps.

Rabbit egg, hard boiled.

Surprisingly few... suspicious.

Porridge?

Meh!

The kind my mum makes.

Favourite thing about Knock?

Last thing in your mouth?

My lip.

Sweetheart Stout

I love you?

Megative Megatoad.

My best buddy.

6 THE SKINNY June 2009

joel

Daddy or chips?

Sweet music, wonderful company, sensational chat, I could go on...

Last thing in your mouth? A juicy green granny smith apple, wonderful.

About as much as I would in a month!

tiger or rabbit egg? Rabbit - there are not enough tigers left (are they just too tasty?!). Huevos Mexicanos!

porridge? Thick with milk.

Kelburn Garden Party

Also On...

Kelburn Castle 20-21 Jun

Hidden within the trees and settled under the shadow of Kelburn Castle is Scotland’s latest addition to the boutique festival scene, The Garden Party. Running from 20-21 June the festival takes place in the grounds and gardens of Kelburn Castle, near Largs. Every summer in recent memory there has been a number of festivals claiming to be that most over used of terms, ‘eclectic’. In fact, many struggle to even be classed as varied, let alone eclectic. But the line up for this year’s Garden Party seems worthy of the description. Country bands will sit comfortably next to dubstep DJs whilst electronic and folk acts perform through the night. Confirmed acts include psychedelic rockers The Aliens, big reggae noise from Mungo’s Hi-fi Soundsystem, and world class electronica from Tom Middleton. Keep an ear to the ground for the particularly excellent Asthmatic Astronaut, who is appearing alongside Lifeshows. Originally appearing on the Japanese undergound label DEJINE, Asthmatic Astronaut has proven to be one of the most exciting artists currently working in Scotland. Late night DJ sets include the creator of the Mixed Bizness and How’s Your Party club nights, Boom Monk Ben, catering for all your electronic/hip-hop/dubstep/ big bass requirements. Glasgow’s Numbers collective will also shake the treetops as they appear with Village Orchestra and Production Unit. Meanwhile Edinburgh’s Robigan promises to bring his extensive back catalogue of dancehall records to the festivities before Mr Mafro and The Kink Dogg of the Kinky Afro club night unleash a loud set of ‘wonky sounds’. The Garden Party promises to offer an unusual line-up in unusual surroundings. Instead of being located in an open field, visitors will navigate through the Kelburn Castle grounds to each stage. The castle’s tennis court will become the dancefloor of the Garden Stage and the surrounding woodland will serve as a

Now there's no reason to be bored in June

canopy above the Village and Garden stages. The Garden Stage will be the main point of contact for many visitors, as it hosts the bigger acts of the festival, such as Bonobo. The Viewpoint Stage will host the dance acts and DJs across the weekend, whilst the Garden Stage will provide ceilidhs and experimental bands, all with a view of Arran and the nearby Firth of Clyde. Art installations curated by Bryony Buttercup will feature throughout the weekend and the castle itself will be floodlit for the entirety of the festival to allow visitors to see the results of the Graffiti Project. The Graffiti Project was completed in June 2007 and

WIN TICKETS TO EDINBURGH INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL!

Edinburgh International Film Festival has teamed up with The Skinny to offer five lucky readers a pair of tickets to the film of their choice, plus a limited edition EIFF goodie bag at this year’s festival. Now in its 63rd year, the EIFF takes place over twelve days (17-28 June), each and every one crammed with fantastic premieres, masterclasses, Q & As, workshops and other special events. Register now at www.edfilmfest.org.uk and get the chance to win lots more great prizes!

involved the former white face of the castle being transformed by three artists and 1000 spray paint cans into the colourful, world renowned canvas that it is today. With the demise of Connect festival and Indian Summer, The Garden Party may just be the new jewel in Scotland’s boutique festival crown. [Chris Duncan] Advance tickets are £58, weekend tickets are £69, Saturday day tickets are £46 whilst Sunday tickets are £32. The Party is an over 18s event.

The Leith Festival is kicking off from Friday 5 June and running ‘til Sunday 14 June, and boasts 150 events in 50 venues all within a one mile radius. The community event has continued to grow and features more comedy, art, music and dance than ever before. The Gala Day and 102nd Parade from Lochend to Leith Links on Saturday 13 June provides a fitting crescendo to the lively and popular highlight to Edinburgh’s calendar. The Made in the Shade gals are taking over the GUU Debating Chamber and Reading Room to host their Summertime Hop, Glasgow’s first indie shopping festival, on Saturday 20 June. The 12 hour music and craft fair combines vintage and handmade goods with rum, cake and rock and roll. Smirnoff Black and Hugo Boss are offering men a little something for the weekend at their Boutique Barbers event at the Hugo Boss store in Buchanan Street from 11-13 June - worth a look if you fancy a free cocktail with your traditional pamperment. Dr Sketchy’s Anti-Art School is giving life drawing a bit more glamour at The Arches in Glasgow on Sunday 21 June with contortionists, fire-jugglers and burlesque stars ready to model for beginners and novices alike. Nous Vous are presenting their Heavy Bones selection of sculptures, drawings and collages from 1-6 June at design hub Analogue, on the Grassmarket in Edinburgh. Leela Soma will be launching her new book Twice Born, a tale about Glasgow seen through the eyes of an Indian, at Borders, Buchanan Street, Glasgow on Thursday 4 June. Dead Ringers’ Jan Ravens will be impersonating the night away at the Brunton Theatre in Musselburgh on 26 June.[Claire Brunton]

www.kelburngardenparty.com

WIN TICKETS TO WICKERMAN FESTIVAL! The Wickerman Festival has always offered much more than your average music fest. This year will prove no exception: besides a line-up including The Human League, The Zutons, Idlewild, Hot Chip (DJ Set) and Billy Bragg, the festival will host an array of on-site activities including mountain biking, yoga, fire walking, and festival punk golf. The Wickerman also retains its reputation for its family atmosphere – children under 12 get in free. The Skinny is giving you the chance to attend the Wickerman on 24 & 25 July, thanks to the two pairs of camping tickets we’re giving away. For more information on the Wickerman, visit www.thewickermanfestival.co.uk.

To enter answer this question :-

Robert Carlyle is perhaps most famous for his portrayal of Begbie in which film?

The Wickerman Festival is inspired by the 1973 film of the same name. Which actor plays the role of Lord Summerisle in the film?

Visit www.theskinny.co.uk/competitions before 10 June for your chance to win!

Visit www.theskinny.co.uk/competitions before 30 June for your chance to win!

Regular Skinny T&Cs apply, available on request.

June 2009

THE SKINNY 7

Heads Up

Previews

REVENGE ! M OF T HE

ONST ER FILM

F EST! EDINBUR GH IN FILM F EST ERNATIONAL TIVAL THIS year’s EIFF is all about the weird and wonderful world of low budget cinema and no one sums this up better than Roger Corman, the king of B movies, who is the subject of an 11 film retrospective. If you’re not familiar with this influential director and producer have a read of our feature this month. He’ll also be appearing in person giving audiences an opportunity to ask him about his work. Also visiting the festival is Joe Dante, director of 80s mini-monster movie Gremlins, his blend of sci-fi and horror is another example of the programme’s focus on films which have gained a cult following. Continuing the festival’s promotion of independent and low budget film-making, there are two strands dedicated to the cuttingedge of indie film-making. Under the Radar brings you films which stray from the straight and narrow – we recommend Zach Clark’s Modern Love is Automatic and Robert Byington’s Harmony and Me – American indie at its most daring. Night Moves on the other hand provides insomniacs and cult movie fans with a late night programme, including Dario Argento’s new flick Giallo and Blaxploitation parody Black Dynamite. Le Donk, in contrast, is an example of an established filmmaker returning to his low-budget roots with a film that was made in 5 days for £30,000. Shane Meadows presents this black and white faux-documentary about a rock roadie (played by Paddy Considine) and will be taking part in an extended Q&A after the screening. And finally, Darren Aronofsky, who has recently made the leap from directing experimental indie films (Pi, Requiem for a Dream) to Oscar-nominated big-hitters (The Wrestler) will be paying the festival a visit. He’ll be talking about his career so far and his future project tackling RoboCop. The event promises to be a fascinating insight into one of America’s most exciting and visionary directors. With more than 100 films showing there’s a real veritable feast on offer. Our advice? Embrace the oddball, the bizarre and the low-budget and welcome this monster film festival with open arms.[Gail Tolley] EDINBURGH INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL RUNS FROM THE 17 – 28 JUNE 2009. WWW.EDFILMFEST.ORG.UK

8 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

Roger Corman is...

King of the Bs

Roger Corman is the godfather of B movies: the Cézanne of sleaze, the Turner of trash, and that’s why this year EIFF are dedicating a retrospective programme to this true titan of American cinema. Michael Gillespie reports.

AT 83, Corman shows no signs of slowing down in a career that has spanned more than fifty years and nearly 400 flicks. His films have ranged from 50s monster mashes (It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters), 60s psychedelia (The Trip), exploitation (Caged Heat, Bloody Mama), horrors, nudie cuties and biker pics; not to mention the provocative racial drama The Intruder (considered his best film) and a series of Edgar Allen Poe adaptations rightly hailed as classics of the genre. He also shot The Little Shop of Horrors in two days and one night, still believed to be a record for any theatrically released motion picture. While he took the industry standard apprenticeships, which saw him rise through the ranks to screenwriter, director and (most successfully) producer, Corman attributes much of his success to his industrial engineering degree, which gave him the efficiency and business sense essential for Hollywood: “Motion pictures are the art form of the 20th century, and one of the reasons is the fact that films are a slightly corrupted art form. They fit this century - they combine art and business!” Cynical maybe, but it makes perfect sense when you consider the talent Corman has sired and the influence of his work. Consider his protégés: Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Peter Bogdanovich, Jonathan Demme, Jack Nicholson, Ron Howard, Sylvester Stallone, Joe Dante,

John Sayles, James Cameron. What this list shows is that the “Roger Corman Film School” (Cameron’s words) gives filmmakers the resourcefulness and discipline they need to progress. According to Scorsese, the experience of working with Corman “was a way of learning to make a picture”. “With Boxcar Bertha, we started on a Monday and four days later you finished… you have a certain amount of shots to get before lunch and you better get them. That’s a very important thing: without having done Boxcar there’s no way I could have done Mean Streets.” Corman still has an eye for talent. Former pupil Howard McCain’s Outlander recently hit cinemas, Paul W S Anderson’s Death Race remake proved a huge hit, while Aberdeen’s Steven Lewis Simpson, currently touring the festival circuit with Rez Bomb, enjoyed a stint at the mogul’s Concorde Pictures (even working on the now infamous Fantastic Four movie). “I learned that making a movie was not the big deal that everybody makes it out to be,” he said. “There was one film I worked on in post-production: Corman went down to the studio on Thursday, saw it was going to be free in a few days, came into the office to pitch on Friday, re-wrote an old script Saturday Sunday, cast Monday Tuesday Wednesday and started shooting on Thursday. They could do that because they had the infrastructure and the attitude to do so.” Corman laments the fact that “today, less that 20-percent of our films get a theatrical release”. But anyone with digital TV and a local video store will know that the avenues and audiences for B movies are scaling new heights.

Companies like Troma, The Asylum and Seduction Cinema are churning out cult hits with a rapidly increasing presence in the mainstream press and academic textbooks. Youtube is crammed with spoof trailers and zero-budget exploit-athons as Tarantino keeps flying the Grindhouse flag, whilst Luc Besson’s Europacorp has produced some of the decade’s most successful low budget genre pictures (Taken, District 13, The Transporter). The recent documentary Not Quite Hollywood argued that the Australian New Wave of the 70s was only possible thanks to the “Ozploitation” boom of the same era. Godard and Truffaut argued the case for B movies in Cahiers du cinéma and used their formal language as the template for the influential experiments of the Nouvelle Vague. And the auteurs of the British New Wave were hardly hurt by the popularity of seaside postcard sex comedies and horror from Hammer and the like. So while it may be true that some B movies are puerile exercises in sex and violence with no artistic or technical merit, it’s a fool who does not appreciate their occasional brilliance and importance in film history. And if care about film history, you care about Roger Corman. A killer B invasion is heading to Auld Reekie: B ready, B ware, B there!

Get Ready for a Cinematic Whipping Modern Love is Automatic was made at weekends, with a tiny cast and on money borrowed from friends and relatives - it carries all the ethos of true guerrilla film-making. Gail Tolley spoke to director Zach Clark about breaking all the rules of conventional film-making.

A DISILLUSIONED nurse searches for an antidote to her feelings of alienation by moonlighting as a dominatrix. Meanwhile her housemate frantically pursues a career in modelling which doesn’t seem to be going much further than her job at the local bed showroom. This is the strange world of Zach Clark’s Modern Love is Automatic, a bold and daring journey into apathy which surprised audiences at SXSW earlier this year. It’s also the perfect example of the best of low-budget, independent film-making. “It really was a sort of home-made thing,” says Clark from his New York home. “I raised a tiny bit of money from my family, and we shot the entire movie on weekends over six months. We’d shoot a little bit and I’d get a pay check or two and save money needed for the next round of shooting.” Intriguingly the film has been described as the love child of John Waters and Chantal Akerman: flamboyant 70s trash meets European feminist cinema with a measure of transgression throw in. What did Clark make of such a perplexing description? “My taste has always been European arthouse, classic American cinema and cult film, so I think those things all integrated in Modern Love. One thing I was specifically toying around with was updating the melodrama. I have always really loved Douglas Sirk, I felt in many ways I was making a women’s picture, a contemporary version of what I saw Sirk doing with his films.” A striking aspect of the film is its choice of

colours, a mixture of neons and bright pastels which came out of a decision to do the exact opposite to what everyone was advising. “Initially the colour palette came out of a reaction to what people kept telling me the colour palette should be. It grew from saying instead of putting the lead actress in drab colours and making her look like she doesn’t really care about her appearance let’s make her look really put together and put her in these vibrant pastels.” Clark’s attitude to the film’s soundtrack is equally reactionary. “The entire score is death metal. I was tired of seeing sad, pretty films with

sad, pretty music. So very early on I was like it won’t be sad, the music won’t be pretty and it won’t even be a style of music that I’m familiar with or that fond of. The initial idea was, oh you want music to tell you how to feel? Here’s music that will tell you how to feel the opposite.” It’s this subversive streak which has continually defined the best films emerging from the American independent scene in the last few years. Modern Love is Automatic looks to carry all the trademarks of one of the most memorable. MODERN LOVE IS AUTOMATIC IS PART OF THE UNDER THE RADAR STRAND AT THIS YEAR’S EIFF.

HIGHBROW HIGHLIGHTS For those whose taste is more Bergman than B-movies, here are our suggestions of the best in arthouse cinema at this year’s festival.

35 Shots of Rum by French filmmaker Claire Denis (Beau Travail, Vendredi Soir) is a simple story of human relationships explored through the father and daughter bond. First shown at the Venice Film Festival last September it received strong reviews for its nuanced portrayal of a young woman growing up and searching for her independence. The acclaimed Iranian film director Abbas Kiarostami (A Taste of Cherry) brings his latest film, Shirin, to Edinburgh. Inverting the conventions of cinema, Kiarostami films audience members as they watch a performance of the Persian story Khosrow and Shirin. The film documents the gradual change in spectators’ reactions as they become immersed in the moving fable. Critic Mark Cousins brings a specially curated programme of Bengali films to a decked out St John’s Church Hall in the form of The Paradise Movie Hall. No doubt bringing the ethos of last year’s intimate film festival The Ballerina Ballroom Cinema of Dreams to the EIFF, this is the perfect opportunity to experience films by Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak and Tapan Sinha in an atmospheric setting. The retrospective includes films ranging from the fifties to the present day and aims to bring a selection of little-known but highlyacclaimed works to a wider audience. There will also be a visit by Satyajit Ray’s Bengali muse and Bollywood movie star Sharmila Tagore. It promises to be a unique movie experience.[Gail Tolley]

When Music Festival meets Film Festival

Since 1999, ATP has offered an alternative to the mud and messiness of the traditional music festival. The film of the same name aims to capture some of the best moments from the past 10 years, including sets by Belle and Sebastian, Portishead and Animal Collective. Gail Tolley caught up with producer Luke Morris to find out more.

How did the ATP film project come about? We felt ATP deserved to be documented. The idea came about in the early days of Warp Films existence, and it seemed a good fit – ATP and Warp have a similar independent artist-driven ethos. I asked Jonathan Caouette (Tarnation) to come on board and we developed this idea of using found and contributed fan and musician footage to create a collage that would try to represent the spirit of the festival. Thurston Moore called ATP the ultimate mix tape and we wanted to convey that idea on film. A variety of footage is used from different sources for the film, what were your reasons for this and what was involved in making the film this way? Doing it this way seemed like the best way to represent the communal atmosphere of the festival and sustain the DIY aspect that All Tomorrow’s

Parties and Warp are all about. It also made sense economically because we started the project off with no money. Unlike many outdoor festivals, where fans camp out in tents, at ATP they would bring camcorders and cameras with them because they have chalets to lock them in. We wanted to take advantage of this as we thought it was the best way to represent the festival’s collective spirit. We posted adverts online, put calls out through the ATP mailing list and trawled YouTube looking for footage captured by fans on mobiles, super 8, HD and DV. We discovered Paris-based filmmaker Vincent Moon (who has since become acclaimed for his Take Away Shows and work with bands like REM and Arcade Fire) this way. He shot footage at Thurston Moore’s Nightmare Before Christmas in 2007, which I think was his first ATP, and sent it to us. The footage was fantastic and we invited him back to every festival since.

We ended up with about 600 hours of footage, with submissions and contributions from over 200 people. Although we only used footage from less than half of them in the final film we still credited everyone. These are the All Tomorrow’s People. Managing the material was pretty chaotic though – so we are forever grateful to Edinburgh-based editor Nick Fenton (Heima, Arctic Monkeys at the Apollo) for helping make sense of it all. At EIFF the film is being shown in two ways, straight up as a film but also with a live performance alongside it. When you were making the film did you have any particular thoughts on how the film should be experienced by an audience? I’m glad that people in Edinburgh will be able to see it on the 24th with a beer in their hands in this incredible immersive environment Future Cinema

are going to create. I wish we could build a holiday camp and have incredible bands play after every screening. What do you think makes the ATP festivals so unique and memorable? The unique setting, the community of fans and musicians, the sense of discovering music, but mainly the fact it’s run by people who care about music and the audience’s experience more than making money. What is your own favourite ATP moment? Grizzly Bear playing unplugged on the beach and watching Salo at 4am in the holiday camp cinema. YOU CAN WATCH ALL TOMORROW’S PARTIES AS PART OF A 360? MUSICAL EVENT AT THE PICTUREHOUSE ON 24 JUNE OR STRAIGHT-UP IN THE CINEMA ON THE 25 JUNE AT THE FILMHOUSE.

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 9

Maddie Frances Walder ditches those Spanish strawberries and Kenyan beans and gets fruity with our indispensable guide to Scotland's natural goodies

THE SKINNY WHISKY GUIDE BY RUTH MARSH

OLD PULTENEY

JAKE BLANCHARD

FOOD AND DRINK

Garden Varieties

WE’RE all aware of cutting back on our air miles in relation to Co2 emissions, yet even the most carbon footprint conscious can turn a blind eye to the environmental damage caused by importation of goods by plane. The key culprits, pulling innocent faces in a supermarket near you, are fresh fruit and veg. Despite the potential to cultivate crops on Britain’s own soil, most stockists order from overseas due to readier availability and a longer shelf life. The result is produce that may look pretty, but has been subject to chemicals galore, not to mention the knock-on effect of less custom for local Scottish suppliers. What’s more, transport by plane generates 177 times more greenhouse gases than shipping. In light of this guilt-provoking statistic, we took the fact that we’re all a bit skint, added a dash of patriotism, blended well with pre-summer detox plans, and cooked up a solution: seasonal, cheap and locally grown fruit and vegetables. Surprisingly, it doesn’t take much effort to root out organic greens from north of the border. So forget Tesco and check out our suggestions for the best Scottish produce of May and June, complete with a where-to-buy-guide and recipe inspiration.

RHUBARB Ah, rhubarb. You may be plagued by a bombardment of negative connotations – grandma’s musty crumble, oozing custard concoctions, mouthing the word over and over in the school play chorus… But this traditional Scottish delight has much to offer the culinary curious: it’s sumptuous in sweets, salads or even smoothies. Rhubarb is cheap, nutritious and surprisingly versatile when dealt with correctly – pick up a hearty bunch at Organic Oasis in Edinburgh or Roots and Fruits on Glasgow’s Byres Road and Great Western Road. RHUBARB IN SPICY BATTER Ingredients 4 large sticks rhubarb 250g flour 2 eggs Splash of milk 1/2 teaspoonful ground ginger, mixed spice and cocoa Handful granulated sugar Instructions • Sieve flour, plus a pinch of salt, into a bowl and add eggs and enough milk to make a batter. • Chop rhubarb into small pieces, arrange in a buttered pie dish and sprinkle with sugar. • Beat the ginger, spice and cocoa into the batter, then pour it over the rhubarb and pop it into a hot oven until crispy- should take about 15 mins.

10 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

TAYBERRIES They may sound like an ingredient from Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory, but these bright little fruits are a delectable cross between raspberries and loganberries, first cultivated in Scotland. Tangy, sharp, yet with just the right level of sweetness, they look great added to salads or deserts, make the perfect addition to a summer cocktail or are just lovely eaten alone. Pick your own from West Craig Farm, South Queensferry, Edinburgh, or visit Lowes Fruit Farm Shop, Dalkeith. TAYBERRY COBBLER Ingredients For the filling: 2 - 3 punnets tayberries 3 tablespoons flour 200g sugar 3/4 teaspoon salt 50g butter For the topping: 200g flour 50g sugar 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 100g butter 50ml milk 1large egg To make the filling: • Stir together the flour, sugar, and salt. • Toss the mixture gently with the fruit, and pile it into a buttered baking dish. • Chop the butter into small pieces and sprinkle them over the fruit. To make the topping: • Preheat oven to 425F. • Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, & salt. • Cut the butter into 1 inch cubes. • Rub butter into the flour mixture until it has a coarse texture • Add the milk and egg to the flour mixture, and mix until just combined. • Drop the mixture over the fruit, tablespoon by tablespoon, leaving openings around each part of the batter. • Place in the oven with a baking sheet underneath it to catch juices. • Bake 35 to 45 minutes, or until juices are bubbling and crust is golden.

WILD MUSHROOMS WILD MUSHROOMS Not the hallucinatory kind but almost as good, these succulent beauties are all too frequently tarred with the ‘pretentious’ brush. Contrary to popular opinion, mushroom and fungi featured in the traditional Scottish diet, and are packed with vitamin D. Check out the suppliers Ardnamushrooms, who cultivate a substantial shiitake mushroom crop in Pembrokeshire and deliver to Edinburgh’s farmers’ market as well as selling their ‘grow your own’ kits online. BARBECUE SHIITAKE MUSHROOMS Ingredients Several large shiitake mushroom caps Port wine Handful of fresh / dried herbs (orgegano, thyme, sage etc) Chopped garlic Parmesan cheese Dash of rice wine vinegar Instructions • Clean mushroom caps, and remove stems. • Place enough wine into cap so that the gills are at least visibly moist. • Add herbs as desired, and cheese. A dash of rice wine vinegar may also be added. • Allow to rest for at least 15 minutes before cooking, to let the wine marinate the mushrooms. • Place on barbecue grill, grill for 3 to 5 minutes

YELLOW TOMATOES YELLOW TOMATOES Our friend the tomato, frequenter of salads the world over and cancer-fighting hero, has had a makeover. Yellow, it seems, is the new red, and it’s not just about image. Yellow tomatoes are slightly sweeter, low in acid and add a splash of unexpected colour to your dinner. One to impress the friends with. Pick up from Fruit Connection in Edinburgh’s Marchmont and you’re jamming. NO-COOK PASTA SAUCE Ingredients 500g ripe tomatoes, skinned, seeded and chopped 150g goat’s cheese, crumbled 6 tablespoons olive oil Large handful fresh basil, torn Instructions Combine all ingredients in a large bowl, season and toss with hot pasta. FOR MORE ON SCOTTISH FRUIT AND VEG, INCLUDING RECIPES, VISIT WWW.THESKINNY.CO.UK

WHAT IS IT? Old Pulteney 12 Year Single Malt WHERE'S IT FROM? Scotland’s northernmost distillery (on the mainland, that is – we didn’t forget you, Orkney) in the lively harbor town of Wick, Pulteney has been spiriting up North Sea tinged whiskies for the last 180 years. This is real hearty mariners’ fare – one sip and you could be bobbing up and down on the ocean, playing poker with sea dogs, polishing your harpoon and getting impure thoughts about that woman who reads the shipping forecast. WHAT'S IT LIKE? Matured in sherry and bourbon casks, this single malt is a rosy, amber-hued concoction that catches the light like iced tea. Its big, powerful nose doesn’t let up when it hits the mouth – this is serious, punchy stuff. Fiery and spicy, it still maintains a pleasing salty-sweetness, with a chewy aftertaste of burnt caramel and throatcoating smoothness. WHERE TO FIND IT? Buy online at www.oldpulteney.co.uk or from Peckham’s in Edinburgh and Glasgow. HOW MUCH? £24.49 for a 75cl bottle WWW.OLDPULTENEY.CO.UK

WWW.SPENCERFIELDSPIRIT.COM

Food and drink

reviews eteaket 41 Frederick St, Edinburgh EH2 1EP 0131 226 2982

Eteaket owner and founder, Erica Moore, is passionate about tea. From central Edinburgh, her boutique and café supplies more than forty different types of tea from around the world. Just when you thought there were only three! Breakfast teas, both English and Scottish, are amongst the most popular, but the shop has a fast-growing following of regular customers discovering new teas from the extensive menu. A must try is the yummy signature tea latté; unlike their milky, often bland coffee counterparts, these are eighty percent tea but just as frothy, making them a filling but lean alternative. All teas are brewed to strict times and temperatures, beautifully preserved and presented, and served with optional milk and sugar. All are available to take away as leaves in small and large caddies. The tea list goes some way to demystifying the art of tea. In essence, there are only three types: black, green and white. These are of varying caffeine and flavour strength. Herbal teas, like chamomile and peppermint,

are not teas at all, but herbal infusions. I sampled a range of teas and amongst my favourites were Organic Silver Needle, a very delicate, young white tea, and Rooibos Crème Caramel, part of the trendy redbush tea family, which is becoming increasingly popular due to its lack of caffeine. And it doesn’t stop there. Coffees are not outlawed – there is a full list as well as free babychinos to accompany an expanding children’s menu. This is a family-friendly venue, somewhere you can treat your mum to cream tea, and equally be at home with friends or young family. With an outside seating area arriving in time for summer and events like tea tasting ceremonies which take the mundane to the sublime, eteaket is worth seeking out. [Yasmin Ali] Free iced or hot tea or coffee with any sandwich or ciabatta if you quote The Skinny. Valid throughout June.

The arches

Drinks from £1.95 (sit-in)

253 Argyle Street, Glasgow G2 8DL

www.eteaket.co.uk

0141 565 1035

The Arches gets things off to a bad start. After being half heartedly deposited in a quiet corner of the restaurant, with some vague jabbing at the specials board, we are left alone to peruse our options. For 45 minutes. Reader, I am a patient woman. I am a woman who will wait a long time for a delicious meal. Provided, that is, that wine is immediately proffered and gently pushed into my clammy little hand, with a friendly smile. Maybe even a wink. At the Arches, however, none of this is forthcoming. With much frenetic waving we catch the attention of two separate waiters and ask them if we might order yet: “Just a minute,” we are told. There is much to be made up for when the food arrives, so it had better be good. And, well, it is good. A starter of haddock, lightly cooked and served cold with boiled quail’s egg, is tangy and flavoursome, while smoked salmon with a piquant chilli and vodka dressing stings a little as it goes

down – but it’s a wholesome nip. A main of confit of duck on beetroot risotto is next. The duck is crispy and tender and the fresh cubes of beetroot and gloopy risotto a perfect complement. Meanwhile haggis, neeps and tatties, and steak, all drenched in a whisky sauce, is rich and nutty. The addition of the rare steak makes it perhaps one of the most masculinely Scottish sights I’ve witnessed since that kilted guy in the advert for porridge oats. Both are tasty. Sour cherry frangipane and chocolate brownie desserts are both sweetly delicious, but with the noise of the bar seeping through to the restaurant area, and The Gossip on at club volume throughout, the atmosphere is a little schizophrenic. The Arches needs to try a lot harder, and maybe crack a smile. [Louise Loftus] Dinner for two inc wine £50 www.thearches.co.uk

Innocence. Excess. Heartbreak. Everyone sees something diﬀerent. Opera. It’s what you make it. Manon May-June 2009 Get £10 tix if you’re under 26. Any seat. Any performance. scottishopera.org.uk

June 2009

THE SKINNY 11

FASHION

IN THE GOLD, 12 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

GOLD NIGHT

FASHION

1 Large gold bracelet £55.00 Small gold bracelet £49.00 Angie Gooderham @ Jenners Large black studded cuff £30.00 Small black studded cuff £20.00 John Lewis

2 Fringed gold necklace £15.00 Topshop

3 Black and gold beaded necklace £155.00 Mimco Nomad Lux @ Jenners

4 Swallow knecklace £12.00 Rusty Zip

Styling Ian Tod www.Iantod.com Photography Hamish Campbell www.hcampbellphotography.co.uk Hair & Make Up Karen Bowen www.karenbowenmakeupartist.co.uk Model Kate from Stolen Agency

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 13

Fashion

Flights of fancy There are many reasons to appreciate Flight of the Conchords: the songs; the David Bowie impressions; the arbitrary anti-Kiwi racism; the ongoing debate over Brett and Jemaine’s relative attractiveness and whether Kristen Schaal is just playing her own annoying self. At the centre of it all stands one thing and one thing alone: Brett’s frankly astonishing collection of wildlife-print jumpers. Where does he get them? How did he end up with such an impressive array? How can he afford them when they’re skint to the point of eating out of bins and he only has one shoe? So many questions. To celebrate the return of a true style icon, we present our own array of wildlifethemed apparel. [Rosamund West] Images based on real-liFe items of clothing, available from: Urban Outfitters, www.urbanoutfitters.co.uk Princes Vintage, stores.ebay.co.uk/princesvintage Illustration by Nick Cocozza

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14 THE SKINNY June 2009

DEVIANCE

What the Hell Would I Do With A 22 Year-Old? 11pm-3am free eVery wednesday

calli mojo noche sin tregua•night non stop

Phoebe Henderson drops her age limits, if not her standards.

a free entry weekly night featuring the best electronic talent edinburgh has to offer!

THU 4TH AD-LIB: Is TUrnIng JApAnese THIs monTH! LIve mUsIc from YosHI, no pAsArAn AnD TokYo ATTAck knIfe, foLLoweD BY AD-LIB’s own off-BeAT eDInBUrgH DJ’s. 10-3 £4 enTrY. frI 5TH creATIve InDUsTrIes: THe BrAIncHILD of A TwIsTeD mInDmeLD, cYmBoL wILL Be sTormIng grv wITH THeIr UnIqUe BrAnD of sonIc mAnIpULATIon! no TUrnTABLes, JUsT ToYs To DrIve YoU wILD! sUpporT from gee DUBs AnD sTepHen Brown. 11-3 £7 enTrY.

sAT 6TH JAm THe BoX: THe JAm THe BoX TeAm BrIng YoU A fIrecrAcker recorDIngs specIAL, wITH HoUse of TrAps AnD fUDge fIngAs DoIng A 3 HoUr seT, mAkIng THe HoTTesT JAm In Town even HoTTer! mIss THIs one AT YoUr own perIL! 11-3 £4 enTrY.non

sUn 7TH TAsTe: fIsHer & prIce wILL Be kIckIng off THe 1sT TAsTe sUmmer pArTY of THe YeAr, In THe LeAD Up To THeIr 15TH BIrTHDAY pArTY! 11-3 £6/£5

frI 12TH DIrT: THeY keep BrIngIn’ IT, YoU keep DIggIn’ ALASDAIR BOYCE

IT! THAT’s How DIrT roLLs! THIs monTH, Beezer HoLmes (mIXTApe) AnD DJAmBA (everYTHIng eLse sUcks) wILL Be In THe mAIn room wITH Ingen (sUBTeXT) AnD TAcTUs (ABAgA recorDs) In THe BAr. 11-3 £2 B4 12 £4 AfTer.

sAT 13TH sUBsTAnce: An ArTIsT wHo HAs eXpLoreD ALmosT everY eLecTronIc genre, DmX crew (ALso known As eDmX) HAs reLeAseD 5 ALBUms on ApHeX TwIn’s LABeL, repHLeX, As weLL As workIng on HIs own LABeL, BreAkIn’ recorDs.

sUn 14TH UnDA-groUnD soUnD: wAnT To keep pArTYIng on A sUnDAY, BUT HAve To Be In BeD BY 12? Don’T worrY, we’ve goT YoU covereD! A meLLow meDLeY of soULfUL UnDergroUnD mUsIc To cAp off YoUr weekenD! 8:30-12:30 free enTrY. weD 17TH TIm Dog & kooL keITH: THe 1sT Dog wITH THe nAme, 1sT Dog In THe gAme, wILL Be sToppIng off AT THe grv As pArT of HIs HIp Hop wILL never DIe ToUr! Doors 7pm £20 enTrY.

frI 19TH rIDDIm TUffA soUnD vs. noIsTeez:

prepAre for TroUBLe, mAke IT DoUBLe! noIsTeez InvADe rIDDIm TUffA’s resIDencY for 3 rooms of THe HeAvIesT BAse In THe cApITAL! 10 DJs spInnIng TUnes on THe fLoor BreAkIng Anon soUnD sYsTem, wITH some eXTrA scoops! 11-3 £4 B4 12 £6 AfTer.

sAT 27TH pULse: pYrATe mUsIc’s Dee monD (www.pYrATemUsIc.co.Uk) wILL Be TreATIng Us To A LIve seT, HIs 1sT sHow In over A YeAr! wITH sUpporT from AnDY proBLems, DJ DArksIDe, JoHn gerArD, AnArkID AnD DArreLL HArDIng. 10:30-3 £5 B4 12 £6 AfTer.

live music info: www.myspace.com/thegrv www.thegrv.com // 37 guthrie street edinburgh // 0131 220 2987 16 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

AS JEREMY has found himself a girlfriend who seems to have a problem with our little ‘arrangement’, I’ve been forced to start looking around for a new playmate. I have lots of attractive male friends who unfortunately have attractive wives and girlfriends in tow, so the thought of having to find someone brand new is about as appealing as thrush. Lucy’s boyfriend has some single friends, which in theory sounds good; however, her boyfriend is 22, as are his mates. What the hell would I do with a 22-year-old? I’ve only slept with someone younger than me once and it was terrible. Lots of fumbling, rubbing three inches above where he should have been aiming for, and he thought for some reason that almost fisting me would be a turn-on. However, for me, life without sex is like nails without varnish: bare and pretty unforgivable. So I decided to meet Lucy, her boyfriend and his friend Richard, a 22-year-old design student, for drinks and essentially a blind date. I voiced my concerns to Lucy. “It’s not really a blind date. He’s seen your picture and thinks you’re gorgeous.” “He’s obviously mental then. Why are you setting me up with someone unstable?” “Shut up. He’s very attractive. Looks like that bloke off the telly.” “Des O’Connor? Matthew Corbett? David Copperfield?” “No, Russell Brand.” “Russell Brand? Hmm. We’ll see.” So, wearing my best undies and a slightly understated jeans and tight t-shirt combo, I made my way to the pub with a feeling of dread, hoping the pub had sufficient quantities of Jack Daniels to make everyone more attractive, including me. I should learn to trust Lucy more. I spotted her with

the other two at the back of the pub. When Richard turned round, looking like a younger, slightly more groomed but fucking gorgeous version of Russell Brand, I went slightly red and gave Lucy a huge ‘I owe you big time’ smile. The evening went well but even though I could have straddled him on his chair purely for looking so hot, my fears were confirmed and we had very little in common: everything was completely superficial. I like my men to challenge me and the only thing he would have challenged me to was a game of tennis on his flatmate’s Wii. Still, I wasn’t marrying the guy, and soon ended up back at the flat he shared with his mate John; nice but a surprising amount of scatter cushions for two straight blokes. We soon started messing around; the kissing was great, but he was over-eager and I had to constantly tell him to slow down. The sex was good, but I got the feeling he wasn’t actually ‘in the moment’ and was nervously trying to cram in as much as possible or work through some mental checklist. When he stopped being so nervous, I caught glimpses of a guy who’d be pretty spectacular in bed. My tolerance for disappointing sex has reached zero, but it’s unfair of me to expect someone to get it right first time or know exactly what I want. The last thing anyone wants is for me to turn into some drill sergeant, screaming “ASSUME THE POSITION SOLDIER!” after a shaky start or some misplaced tongue action. So, I’ve shagged a younger man and although it wasn’t great, it actually wasn’t bad. At all. I’ve got his number and I may give him a call at some point. He may not rock my world, but I’m quite willing to see if he rocks my bed. A girl has needs, after all.

As a queer woman married to a man, Lindsay Thomas feels like the exception to the rule fellow queers didn’t instigate this feeling. But at Pride in 2000, I encountered a preacher condemning the beautiful people around me for one day, one day out of the year, openly and proudly being who they were. Then he looked at me strolling hand in hand with my husband and praised us, saying our relationship was a beautiful thing.

"The feeling of invisibility hurts not because such cuts are deep, but because they’re tiny and everywhere and all the time" Most people aren’t actually that homophobic. They don’t have to be. Most people, in fact, mean well. Very few people intend to marginalise me; very few realise they’re hurting me. The feeling of invisibility hurts not because such cuts are deep, but because they’re tiny and everywhere and all the time. Because they’re tiny, sometimes I’m not even sure they happened. But they add up. Every time I get a forwarded e-mail about the supposed differences between men and women, I cringe. Every time I share a dressing room with a friend who doesn’t know about me and off-handedly says it’s a good thing we’re all girls here, I wince. And every time someone makes a joke about gay people, even a joke that isn’t malicious (and most aren’t), I struggle with whether to comment and embarrass a friend or to ignore one more tiny cut.

A Slutty Farewell

Kate Copland

I’m constantly reminded that I’m invisible. Not because I’m 5’1”, or because I have superhuman powers, but because I’m a queer woman married to a man. I don’t have a sandwich board I can wear to correct this condition, and I don’t have a bell I can ring. I just look like a straight person in a heteronormative relationship, and it’s kind of a bummer. Okay, my relationship doesn’t look totally heteronormative. I don’t wear an engagement ring, for one thing. I didn’t even want one. My husband probably does more housework than I do, he does almost all the cooking, and I’m a much bigger sports fan than he is, so I’m the one with my feet up on the couch, watching the game or the race at the weekend. True, friends find our many stereotype inversions surprising, but somehow that doesn’t make people wonder about me. I’ve been asked before whether he is secretly gay (apparently men aren’t supposed to like shopping for shoes), but nobody asks the same question about me. Strangely, I never encounter this problem in the queer communities I inhabit. My non-straight friends are perfectly comfortable with thinking of me as not straight. They’re also fine with my relationship. They seem to get the point: if you’re going to tear down the walls dividing who gets to love whom, it doesn’t make sense to go back and erect new ones. I’m not saying that living the examined life is always guaranteed to produce a more enlightened human; I’ve met my share of jerks in the community. But if you’ve been forced to question the assumptions you were raised with in order to integrate your new understanding of yourself, particularly with something as central as sexuality, perhaps you’re more open to the idea that life doesn’t stick to a script. Not everyone gets or likes that idea. The flack I get in my life is from straight women, and it’s mostly related to my deviations from script. “Why don’t you make him get you an engagement ring?” they ask. “You could still get one now. Make him get you a big diamond, at least half a carat.” Most of the time, I don’t want to hurt their feelings (they all have rings, of course), so I don’t explain to them that I dislike the idea of wearing a symbol that he doesn’t also wear, that I can’t disconnect the engagement ring from the idea of dowry, that I would feel like chattel, and that it’s ridiculous to cast me and him into such rigid gender roles. In my mind, we are two people, not a man and a woman. But that would just confuse and alienate them, I convince myself. So instead I laugh lightly about washing dishes all the time, and change the subject. I’m not doing myself or the women in my life any favours, but pretending my brand of feminism doesn’t exist is easier than launching a one-woman crusade. So I negate myself, loathe myself for it, and feel lonely. I have even managed to feel negated at Pride, one of the most inclusive spaces imaginable. Once again, my

review Pink Links Deep Blue, edinburgh

Erin, accounts assistant at The Skinny, favours the direct approach. “What about her? Have you slept with her?” she asks as my friend joins us in the pub. Actually, yes: but it was an isolated incident and we haven’t discussed it since. Undeterred, Erin prods us both for details. (I describe the encounter as hot; my friend says it was “all right”. Marvellous.) Later, thanks to that icebreaker, I finally confess to my friend that actually I’ve always been keen for more. Turns out she is too. Result! But it does beg a few questions: such as, if I’m supposedly so sexually liberated, why did I faff around and avoid the issue for over a year? And the thing is, I’m not even scared

Deviance

"I Feel Like I'm Invisible"

of rejection - I was tiptoeing around so much simply because I didn’t want to make her feel weird. I think I’ve just discovered that sometimes you can employ too much discretion. Another learning experience, and all thanks to Erin and her unsubtle ways. • A note on Slutty McWhore: it’s been a fun year, but she’s taken a break from writing for The Skinny. We hope she’ll rejoin us at some point, but not to worry - you can still enjoy our sex columnist, Phoebe Henderson, and browse Slutty’s full archive on The Skinny website. We hear she’s alive and well, and doesn’t seem to have gotten arrested. Long may that continue.[Nine]

rrrr Speed dating? Mention that’s your plan for the evening and reactions seem to suggest that you are insanely brave. It’s not that bad, surely? Initial reservations/terror were quickly placated at the event, Pink Links (speed dating for girls who like girls), downstairs at the Blue Moon. For starters, there was no initial, excruciating descent into a silently staring judgmental room, as I’d anticipated; we sat upstairs and enjoyed a bottle or two of Dutch courage before the lovely organiser beckoned us below come start time. There, with about ten other giggly women, the details of the night were revealed. Rather than regimentally switching to the next table at the sound of a whistle, we were all scattered about the cosy venue and left to talk for roughly three and a half minutes, after which we all

switched tables. Three and a half minutes was ideal for either running out of things to say, or being animatedly in the middle of something very very important - so that you’d simply have to meet up again and finish whatever it was you were saying. The whole evening was relaxed, friendly and possibly the most pressure-free dating event I’ve attended. And afterwards, everyone having now been introduced, we all went off to the pub and got hammered. Brilliant start to a night out, something completely different, and a great way to meet new people. Strongly recommended.[SD] Deep Blue, 7pm, first Friday of each month £5, includes free pass to GHQ Next date: 5 June. www.pinklinks.biz

June 2009

THE SKINNY 17

Showcase Jessica Ramm

dundee degree show special:

To attempt to hold fast an instant is doubtful To bind an emotion is unthinkable To petrify love impossible It is beautiful to be transitory How lovely it is not to have to live forever -Jean Tinguely It is our hunger that keeps us alive. Yet our appetite binds us, consumes us, makes us vulnerable and fragile. From the devotee who breathes in the curling incense of the temple in Karnataka to the shrouded figure who appears to be repeatedly banging his head off the wailing wall in Jerusalem. From the weeping woman who kisses the stone slab in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to the man who inhales the dusty odour of his prayer rug as he prostrates towards Mecca. We crave significance, we search for a message. We wish for the occluded to be revealed to us. Yet it is the not-knowing that strings us along one step after another. It is the ache in our belly that reminds us we are still here. Still mortal. -Jessica Ramm When we speak of the word â&#x20AC;&#x153;lifeâ&#x20AC;?, it must be understood we are not referring to life as we know it from its surface of fact, but to that fragile fluctuating centre which forms never reach. -Artaud

18 THE SKINNY June 2009

June 2009

THE SKINNY 19

Digital

Seth Godin:

Optimism at Crunch-time RJ Thomson talked exclusively to one of the world’s leading business minds, Seth Godin, about his challenging new book Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us, and why life ain’t so shitty after all Estate agents and lawyers don't have a particularly good rep (and bankers aren't too popular these days), but when comedian Bill Hicks famously ranted 'if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself... you are Satan's little helpers', the crowd cheered. And it's fair to say, he knew the crowd would take the line. Now, Seth Godin is possibly the most famous marketing expert in the world, and it's pretty safe to say he'd look Hicks in the eye on this one. While Hicks identifies marketers as 'ruining everything that's good', anyone who has read any of Godin's stuff (and lots of people have, his is the most widely read marketing blog in the world, and one of the biggest business blogs in general (1)) will know that he leads with a strongly ethical standpoint: responsibility, creativity, sticking with what you know to be remarkable, marketing by actually being good. It wouldn't be a million miles off to identify 'no sell out' principles in Godin’s marketing point of view. It's quite reassuring to know his voice is so influential.(2) Yet Godin seems to be in on the joke too. Among the bestselling books he's written, one was called All Marketers Are Liars. His point of view has long been that most of what we do, most human behaviour, is marketing in some shape or form. Despite this, Godin is also distinctly capitalist, albeit with a more open mind than the widely-perceived archetypal fatcat. It's a bit of a risk for a UK-based alternative arts mag to run an interview with an American businessman, even if he is also a writer, and even in these (partially) optimistic post-inauguration times. Marketing can be optimistic, it can be ethical, but it's still some way off being cool. But when it's a question of worldview, Seth Godin is clearly a man with a lot to teach. One of the reasons to speak to him this month is because of the very shakiness of global capitalism just now: an outspoken believer in creative entrepreneurship and 'heretical' approaches to your career, he sees the 'Credit Crunch' as the dawning of a new age of opportunity, particularly for those open to new initiatives. And, as the debacle surrounding the bid to set up 'Creative Scotland' continues messy, this is a particularly appropriate time for artists and creatives alike to look to the opportunities they can create for themselves. Godin is an encouraging voice, and one who speaks with authority. He also has a book out on the merits of taking the risk of creative leadership - Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us - which contains a mix of inspiring casestudies and hard-line yet unorthodox ways of looking at common problems. It comes recommended, not least because it fits with the original ethos of the magazine you're reading: believe in your own ideas, and make them real. RT: This a time when many around the world are filled with a sense of financial foreboding, yet you see it as a time of great opportunity. What are the main avenues there? SG: I think there are at least three. The best people are under-engaged. Not just the best employees, but the best investors and the best customers. They can focus. Markets are quieter and it's easier to make a splash. It's cheaper than ever to launch a new venture, which means you can walk into a quiet market with great people and make an impact for not a lot of money. What are you most looking forward to in 2009? This is the year that the internet is everywhere, when hope returns and when big ideas make a resurgence. Your profession is as a marketer, yet you're frequently to be found taking on ideas like imagination, fundamentalism and even religion. To what extent do you think this is a reflection on

20 THE SKINNY June 2009

'marketing' and how it's perceived, and how much is it a result of your personality? Marketing has changed from a one-note (buy ads!) craft into a far-ranging profession, something that requires real understanding of how things work and how we got here. That and I'm fascinated by this stuff. When I spoke to Charles Leadbeater about his concept of 'We-Think'(3), he said recognition was one of the main motivators for people to act. In Tribes, you make the formula that 'initiative = happiness'. Why do you think taking the initiative feels so fulfilling? I think people enjoy taking initiative for a few reasons. It implies a level of control, certainly. It also is a bit like Christmas, because there are presents, unexpected ones, every morning! You use the example of the recent failure of the music industry in Tribes, but also demonstrate how good the Grateful Dead were at inspiring their tribe of fans. Why do you think an industry like that, which would seem to lend itself to tribal leadership so naturally, went so far wrong? Big difference between the 'music' part and the 'industry' part. The industry folks want control and cash. Those are two things you don't get right away from a tribe, so they missed it. I think we're beginning to see a whole generation of artists who don't dream of record deals. That means that the creativity in spreading a message and making a living is going to be astounding. When I spoke to Mel Young of the Homeless World Cup, he suggested that social responsibility had moved from the church, to the state, to the charity sector, and was now moving in the direction of business. To what extent do you think this is the case, and if so what do you think are the big questions around that shift? I totally agree. It's a good place for it to be, but it's awfully sad that the other sectors failed at this. The thing is, as cycles get shorter, businesses are understanding that they are responsible for the side effects of their actions. Tribes seems to be as much about leadership as it is about marketing, but also suggests that leadership can't always be for everyone. What is the distinction between the two, and does this mean that there are some people who don't deserve to be heard? I think the most effective form of marketing is no longer advertising, it's leadership. Every organization that wants to grow must lead. Every employee doesn't have to, but the happy and productive and profitable ones will. I think it's a learnable skill. What bores you? Meetings. You've argued in the past that people are now so attuned to marketing messages that marketers now need to earn the right to speak to them about things that are of genuine benefit. For decades now, some thinkers have worried that we're living in an age of inescapable self-awareness, heightened by advertising; do you think permission-based business may indicate a way out of that vicious circle? I think people have been self-aware and focused since Narcissus. It's not going away, no way. It's going to get worse. Do you distinguish business from art? Artists can do business, most don't. Businesses can make art, most don't.

ILLUSTRATION by PAUL RYDING

(1) Godin's blog is at: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/ - recent posts cover stretching your creativity, making what you do something other people will love, and Martin Luther King Day. He is also a reknowned speaker. You can view a recent TED Conference speech, at which Godin appeared alongside the likes of environmentalist Al Gore, sociologist Malcolm Gladwell and Amazon-founder Jeff Bezos AT TED.COM (2) In truth Hicks and Godin could probably come to some kind of agreement. Hicks’ main beef is with the placing of a dollar sign on everything; Godin argues in his new book Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Penguin) that you’ll never market most effectively if you put money first. (3) With ‘We-Think’ Leadbeater suggests that the most effective way for people to work efficiently is to collaborate, particularly in an online world, with such options as open-source creativity.

DIGITAL

REVIEWS FRIGHT OF THE BUMBLE BEES OUT NOW ON PC , £6.00

rrr The developers have managed well to emulate the character and atmosphere of the Wallace and Gromit series of animated films, and while you initially miss the familiar voice of Peter Sallis as Wallace, you quickly get used to it as you get involved in the plot of the game. The fun from any point and clicker like this comes down to the quality of the humour and the puzzles. The jokes should be funny, and the puzzles should be logical, giving a real sense of achievement when you solve one. Sadly the game relies too heavily on the comedy accents provided by the cast, and the overuse of Gromit stopping to look at you directly with a fed up expression whenever his master does anything silly can grate. Fans of the films will likely be well entertained though, and perhaps the game is targeted at a younger audience who will be able to laugh out loud at comedy bees and demented old army majors, but then the puzzles are in no way suitable for newcomers to the genre. Whilst some of the puzzles were logical and fun to work out, there’s just a few too many that could have you clicking on lots of different items and then clicking on other items in the forlorn hope that something might

eventually happen to help you. Overall, the game is enjoyable to play, it just could have been better. And while the game is short - taking a fraction of the completion time of some of it’s larger competitors if it had more logical puzzles - at roughly £6.00 per episode, it’s good value for any fan of the genre. [Murray Kendall]

VALKYRIE PROFILE: COVENANT OF THE PLUME OUT NOW ON NINTENDO DS ,£29.99

rrr Previous titles in the series have put the player in control of the Valkyrie, the Goddess of death who heaps despair on all who cross her path (mwuhahaha, etc). However this time round the onus of the player is placed on a character named Wylfred who is eager to seek vengeance on the Valkyrie herself for the death of his father in battle. There is no room for kindness while battling enemies either. The party of characters are tactically controlled by grid squares. Each figure is moved with the stylus in this way, advancing towards enemies in a tactical battle. And you can forget the sweet innocence of merely sending the enemy to sleep or badly injuring them; you are wholeheartedly encouraged to beat the living daylights out of opponents — even when they’re practically dead. The insatiable need to carry out acts of evil is what sets this title aside from the norm. A game that not only rewards you for sadistic acts but punishes you for compassion is too delightfully twisted to ignore. For the most part the screen is neatly divided, most if not all functions are accessible via the stylus and there are no particular sound effects that would upset the ear. It’s a shame that battle scenes seem to drag on as a result of the sluggish turn-based mechanics, and for what it’s worth the visuals are a little too grey for comfort. Expect to be at the helm of command for long a great deal of time — it’s a lengthy adventure with many alternate endings and the replay value is definitely there. [Stacy Kidd]

DIGITAL CULTURE HIGHLIGHTS THIS JUNE The world’s oldest continually running film festival returns in June. This year the Edinburgh International Film Festival has included several digital events in its stellar exhibition of UK and international film-making. Producer Phil Streather will be explaining the secrets of the technology which has cinemas across the country clamouring to become 3D enabled at the 3D Explained event at Cineworld on 27 June (10.30, £6.50/£5.50). Streather will use his 2003 production Bugs! (which is currently being given the 3D treatment) to explain how the technology works and what significance the 3D revolution has in artistic terms. The festival is also showcasing a number of programmes of animation shorts. The best of new British and international shorts fusing traditional techniques with modern technology will be shown as part of the McLaren Animation and International Animation programmes at Filmhouse

on the 20/21 and 21/22 June respectively (20 Jun - 18.20, 21 Jun - 12.00 (International) and 18.45 (McLaren), and 22 Jun 11.15, all £6.50/£5.50). Edinburgh University’s Informatics department will host its annual (public) Milner Lecture on 1 June. And Logic Begat Computer Science: When Giants Roamed The Earth by Rice University’s Moshe Y. Vardi will address the growing interaction between logic and computer science (16.00, 10 Crichton Place, Edinburgh). The Electron Club’s Open Day will take place on Saturday 13 June at Glasgow’s Centre for Contemporary Arts (14.00-20.00). The Electron Club is a volunteer-run space for those interested in open source software, hardware hacking and audio and video editing to meet and share ideas and equipment. The Open Day will provide to opportunity to see and try out the range of technology members have come up with and meet others with similar interests. [Claire Brunton]

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 21

REading

Six Questions In Search Of An Author

What makes an author an author? It's a question as old as the profession itself. Keir Hind asked this year's Scottish Mortgage Trust Book Awards category winners the same six questions about their work to find out. Janice Galloway Winner: Best Non-Fiction for This Is Not About Me.

Tom Pow Winner: Best poety for his collection dear alice: Narratives of madness.

How did you come to the decision to write this book? I’m not that sure I did! I was writing something and realised part-way into the thinking and running over the drafts of that thinking that the people emerging from under my fingers at the keyboard were becoming too familiar for comfort. For once, I braced myself, came to terms with it and let them loose.

How did you come to the decision to write this book? I began to work for the University of Glasgow in Dumfries, which is based at the nineteenth century Crichton Institution for Lunatics. It’s a striking site, very beautiful and with lots of rich associations. There’s a wonderful archive of material about the asylum – patients’ art work, doctors’ notes – and under the guidance of Morag Williams, who was the archivist then, I began to explore various narratives.

Did you plan out the work before you started writing, or did the material shape the structure? No. Planning is something I have to avoid for a while at least – if I don’t surprise myself while I’m writing I won’t have a hope of surprising anyone else either. Letting the thing flow is the hard bit, the wild bit. Then, the refining, the clearer picking out of the shapes, the rewriting – that’s more planned, deliberately surgical than anything else. I doubt your work is ever easy, but in a relative sense, how difficult was it dealing with this material as compared to your other work? Writing This is Not About Me was more like Clara in terms of structure than anything else – the “plot”, as it were, was notionally already there. And I still had to recreate people I could see and hear clearly in my head vividly enough to allow other people to see them and hear them too. A very basic question: were there any specific reasons for choosing the title? The title was the only shield I had left! There are LOTS of reasons I had to call it that. 1) it’s really not about me, it’s about Cora and Beth and everyone else who makes the child. The raising of children obsesses me, especially the attitudes beneath the surface in this country. This was a clear and desired political reason for writing the book. 2) You always hope your writing – fiction, poetry. play or whatever – is not you, but an open invitation for others to find themselves in what you write. I’d be disappointed if any book I wrote was “about me” in essence. How dull would that be? Followed by, perhaps, a cheeky question: do you have favourite parts of the book, or favourite stories that you drew on? In terms of “favourite stories”, quite the opposite. I missed a good many “family stories” out as too chatty and incidental. And can you tell me what your working procedure is? Scribbler. I find writing a comfortless business, like drawing my own teeth. Sitting for hours in the redrafting. Janice Galloway's previous books include The Trick Is To Keep Breathing and Clara, a fictional book about Clara Schumann. This Is Not About Me is out now. Published by Granta Books. Cover price £8.99 paperback.

22 THE SKINNY June 2009

Did you plan out the work before you started writing, or did the material shape the structure? I just plunged in at the points that most excited me and after a while I realised it might be possible to write a whole collection on the theme of narratives of madness. I doubt your work is ever easy, but in a relative sense, how difficult was it dealing with this material as compared to your other work? I suppose this is the first collection that’s had no autobiographical element, although the fact that I was at the Crichton every day at work means there’s some autobiographical elements carried into the collection. But I’ve always been interested in narrative in poetry and always interested in exploring historical incident. A very basic question: were there any specific reasons for choosing the title? To begin with, there is the title poem in the book, Dear Alice, which I like and which I wrote after my fellow poet Diana Hendry gave me the spark to write it. And I suppose that is the most autobiographical poem in the book. My son used to be obsessed with Peter Pan, so I did a lot of Captain Hook duty, some of it at the grand rockery at the Crichton site. The ‘narratives of madness’ is to establish that it is stories I’m interested in, which is why the book ends with the Don Quixote poem. Followed by, perhaps, a cheeky question: do you have favourite parts of the book, or favourite stories that you drew on? I hope the book makes a unity and that each poem earns its keep. There are of course many possible stories that I didn’t use in the book, such as that Arthur Conan Doyle’s father was one of the inmates for a time. And one story I particularly enjoyed was that during the First World War one of the inmates escaped and went to England; there, it transpired he had ‘done his bit’ working as an attendant in an English asylum. And can you tell me what your working procedure is? This project involved a fair amount of reading and research, so I would do that and let it settle, before working on it. What suits me best is getting a length of time – a few days, a month – without any other distractions and working intensively. Then back at the home desk, I can endlessly tinker and revise. Tom Pow teaches creative writing at Crichton Campus, in Dumfries. Dear Alice: Narratives of Madness is out now. Published by Salt publishing. Cover price £12.99 hardback.

Andrea McNicoll Winner: Best First Book for Moonshine in the Morning.

How did you come to the decision to write this book? I have loved books and stories for as long as I can remember. Being a writer seemed to me the best thing anyone could be but I had no confidence to really start writing until I found a subject that moved me so much I couldn’t help but write about it. Did you plan out the work before you started writing, or did the material shape the structure? At first my intention was to write a collection of short stories but as I wrote the material grew into something different. I had ideas for different characters, narratives and themes which I ended up weaving together to celebrate a whole community and its way of life.

James Kelman Winner: Best Fiction for Kieron Smith, boy.

How did you come to the decision to write a book centred around a young boy? I don’t make such decisions. It is not part of how I operate as a writer. I work on many things then gradually this narrows until I am concentrating on a few, then a couple, then finally on one. Incidentally, Kieron isn’t always a young boy. He begins the narration approaching five years of age, and ends it approaching thirteen. Did you plan out the work before you started writing, or did the material shape the structure? I never plan any such thing. It would be death. I doubt your work is ever easy, but in a relative sense, how difficult was it dealing with this material as compared to your other work? It required that I had written the earlier work.

I doubt your work is ever easy, but in a relative sense, how difficult was it dealing with this material as compared to your other work? Because I lived in a small Thai community for 9 years I had plenty of time to observe, question and reflect on what grew into the material for my novel. Once I started writing I was never stuck for ideas – it did seem to flow quite easily. The second book is proving much more tricky – I hope I won’t have to wait 9 years for it to gestate!

A very basic question: Were there any specific reasons for choosing the title Kieron Smith, boy? No specific reasons but it isn’t ‘Kieron Smith, Boy’, it is ‘Kieron Smith, boy’; and that lower case ‘b’ is crucial.

A very basic question: were there any specific reasons for choosing the title? The original title was ‘Fat of the Land’ but my publisher didn’t like it! I came up with a list of alternative titles and Moonshine in the Morning is the one that was chosen. It refers to the moonshine whisky some of the village men drink – sometimes until dawn.

And can you tell me what your working procedure is? I work whenever I can, from early morning onwards. I can’t say I scribble ideas. There again, I can’t say I don’t. Very rarely I do scribble something – usually if I’m travelling someplace – not an idea, more like a phrase or a word, but I don’t really look at these scribbles again, except by accident, if I’m sorting out old betting-slips.

Followed by, perhaps, a cheeky question: do you have favourite parts of the book, or favourite stories that you drew on? There are some comic moments that I really enjoyed writing. I feel affection for all the characters. Mother Pensri, Sergeant Yud and Gop Guu might just stand out. Coming back to write about a character that’s already established is tremendous fun – like meeting an old friend. And can you tell me what your working procedure is? I find that the more free time I have, the less I write. The less I write, the worse I feel about myself which means I need to go out to work for both psychological and financial reasons!

Moonshine in The Morning is out now. Published by Alma Books. Cover price £14.99 paperback.

Followed by, perhaps, a cheeky question: do you have favourite parts of the book, or favourite stories that you drew on? Often the sections that were the more difficult to write become favourites but it is a sort of pseudofavouritism; I’m just glad to finish the buggers without falling off the tightrope.

James Kelman has been shortlisted for this year’s Man Booker International Prize. He previously won the Booker prize for his novel How Late It Was, How Late. Kieron Smith, boy is out now. Published by Penguin. Cover price £8.99 paperback

Check out theskinny.co.uk for extended answers, as well as bonus questions, that, unfortunately, we did not have the space to print here. for more information on the Scottish mortgage trust book awards go to: tinyurl.com/oycmmj

THE POCKET ESSENTIAL ALAN MOORE

Edinburgh’s Music and Audio Library a feast of music …

BY LANCE PARKIN

rrr This is an update of a 2001 printing of this book, a comprehensive guide to master graphic novelist Alan Moore. The book’s approach is, roughly, to tell Moore’s life story, pausing for analysis whenever Moore writes something new. This works quite well, because after promising beginnings Alan Moore’s work became consistently fascinating. From Marvelman and V for Vendetta through Watchmen and From Hell to the present day, this book covers it all succinctly but fully. There have been personal low points for Moore, particularly the legal wrangles over Marvelman and, later, film rights. Parkin summarises these about as concisely as he can. The most revealing sections of the book deal with lost projects, including the very promising Big Numbers which disappeared after one issue. There’s not much in the book that wasn’t in the 2001 edition, but this is a very useful guide for fans of comics. [Keir Hind]

RELEASE DATE: 1 JUN. PUBLISHED BY POCKET ESSENTIALS. COVER PRICE £6.99

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ONLINE THESKINNY.CO.UK DON’T RHYME FOR THE SAKE OF RIDDLIN’: THE AUTHORISED STORY OF PUBLIC ENEMY BY RUSSELL MYRIE

rrrr This is a fairly standard biography that’s lifted above the norm by having a fascinating subject. Public Enemy are one of the greatest hip hop acts ever, and that’s because they (and Chuck D in particular) actually had something important to say. They thrived on rapping about political or public issues, and created huge controversy as a result. This is an authorised biography, which is usually a sign of an anodyne, cleaned up story. But Public Enemy have nothing to hide, and their collective contributions to the book almost always seem open and honest, down to (mercifully briefly) discussing Flavor Flav’s child support payments. The author occasionally overcooks his writing, like when he describes The Bronx as ‘the borough that mothered this rap shit.’ He’s usually more controlled and his contribution as a researcher outweighs any occasional lapses. It’s aimed at existing fans, but PE’s story is compelling enough to have some crossover appeal. [Ryan Agee] RELEASE DATE: 18 JUNE. PUBLISHED BY CANONGATE. COVER PRICE £9.99 PAPERBACK.

THE MERRY MUSES OF CALEDONIA

DREAMS FROM THE ENDZ

BY ROBERT BURNS

BY FAIZA GUENE

rrrrr

rrrr

The Merry Muses of Caledonia is Robert Burns’ collected ‘racy’ poems. But not exactly, because some of them are simply poems or songs Burns collected himself and some are only tentatively attributed to Burns and some belong to a few other categories too. The problems in assembling this text are explained in Valentina Bold’s comprehensive introduction. This is probably the best approximation of an original collection that Burns made for his own amusement in a notebook, which has been lost to time. So what’s in it? Poems, by Burns, with titles like The Fornicator and Nine Inch Will Please A Lady. They’re good too, as you might expect, and this edition includes a generous supply of supplementary material to help you get as much enjoyment out of the collection as possible. There are cheaper collected editions of Burns out there, but this very fine edition would make a great gift for any Burns fan. [Nat Smith]

READING

REVIEWS

This is a book about a 24 year old girl in the big city. However, the girl, Ahleme, is an Algerian immigrant living in Paris, and this makes a big difference. She still has problems like falling in love with the wrong guy or falling out with friends – but there’s a political backdrop to this too, because Ahleme and her friends have to struggle to stay in a country where the law is biased against them. The book is very well written, and well translated, although the attempt to translate Parisian slang by substituting British slang is a little forced. Nonetheless, Ahleme is a very appealing protagonist, whether she’s helping her disabled father or getting her delinquent brother out of trouble. And, importantly, she’s one of the only young Muslim women in fiction that I’ve ever found authentic. This is fresh, fascinating, literature – and look out for the extremely appropriate last sentence. [Keir Hind]

‘Goats Head Soup’ was an album by which group? Which progressive British band issued ‘Larks Tongues in Aspic’? Who ordered Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavoured Water? American Pie, Whiskey and Rye, for this good ol’ boy? Too much Hard Candy for dessert? Cigarettes and Alcohol from Manchester? Check out the answers on our blog at: http://talesofonecity. wordpress.com or come into Edinburgh’s Music and Audio Library and find out for yourself!

Largest music library in Scotland• Order and collect music via any library • Diverse • Specialist • Knowledgeable staff Edinburgh Music and Audio Library 9 George IV Bridge Edinburgh www.edinburgh.gov.uk/libraries http://talesofonecity.wordpress.com

relax, escape and enjoy

RELEASE DATE: 4 JUN. PULISHED BY VINTAGE. COVER OUT NOW. PUBLISHED BY LUATH PRESS. COVER PRICE £15

PRICE £7.99.

THESKINNY.CO.UK/BOOKS JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 23

Film

The Beautiful Game Looking for Eric is full of the unexpected. Not only is it a comedy from an unlikely director, it also stars the football legend Eric Cantona who demonstrates, among other things, his skill at playing the trumpet. Gail Tolley finds out that what initially sounds like an unlikely premise actually works rather well.

june Film Events

Loads of kick-ass stuff coming up...

little ashes

This month, forget about the Edinburgh International Film Festival. Aberdeen is the place to be on 20 June, when the Belmont is hosting Robert Pattinson Day! This is not just a day for Twilight fans though. Catherine Hardwicke’s adaptation has made Pattinson a household name, and subsequently brought some small, independent films some much needed publicity. Here is a chance to see Little Ashes, a Spanish/British Salvador Dali biopic focussing primarily on his unconsummated love of Federico Garcia Lorca, and How To Be, a tale of self-discovery through self-help books. And fear not, Twilight is also part of the programme.

twilight

If brooding vampires are not your thing, the Belmont is also screening a preview of Looking For Eric, a social-realist take on Eric Cantona’s famously philosophical mentality, on 4 June, with a satellite Q&A session with director Ken Loach. This can be viewed at the Cameo in Edinburgh also, which is showing another advance screening the following day, including a live Q&A with screenwriter Paul Laverty. Ken Loach and Paul Laverty prove themselves to be one of cinema’s strongest director-writer duos with their latest film Looking for Eric. Like the pair’s previous collaborations (My Name is Joe, Sweet Sixteen) Looking for Eric is rooted in the challenging world of working-class Britain, but unlike those films it contains a good dollop of comedy and some gentle surrealism to tell a story of male friendship, football, and how to find your feet during life’s more challenging times. Eric Bishop (Steve Evets) is a postman from Manchester who is dreading the prospect of meeting his ex-wife, Lily (Stephanie Bishop), after more than 30 years and who has begun to feel that life has passed him by. One night, with the help of a spliff stolen from his son’s bedroom, Eric’s football idol Eric Cantona pays a visit and offers some words of advice to help him get his life back on track. Speaking at the first showing of the film in Cannes, Loach spoke of his desire to turn his hand to something more light-hearted. “We had done a couple of films that were really quite tough so we thought it might be nice to do a film with a smile on our faces.

You can say [that] a comedy is a tragedy with a happy ending and the story in this film could go many different ways. I guess we felt that what we had to do was play the story with truth and I think that’s a tribute to the actors we worked with. They played it dead true and sometimes that’s funny and sometimes it’s sad.” At the heart of Looking for Eric is a human story about one man coming to terms with the way his life has panned out and his relationships with those around him. Yet hovering not far beneath the narrative there is also a more far-reaching political message, something that Loach is particularly known for. As the director says, “It’s a film against individualism: we’re stronger as a gang than we are on our own. You can be pretentious about this but it is about the solidarity of friends, which is epitomised in a crowd of football supporters. But also where you work and the people you work alongside. Although that seems an almost trite observation, it’s still not the spirit of the age. Or it hasn’t been the spirit of the age for the last 30 years, where people are your competitors, not your comrades.”

Festival season is upon us No sooner has Cannes finished and we’re straight into preparations for this year’s Edinburgh International Film Festival. In many ways the two seem to complement each other. Cannes 2009 was distinguished by the sheer number of films from world famous and established directors: Almodovar, Von Trier, Tarantino, Haneke, Jane Campion…the list goes on. Edinburgh on the other hand has created a programme that embraces the weird and wonderful, from the ‘King of Bs’ Roger Corman to an In Person event with Darren Aronofsky to the best rising independent talent. Whilst there may be fewer films from time-honoured auteurs there will

no doubt be more opportunities to uncover hidden delights and stumble across unexpected successes. Have a look at this month’s cover feature for our suggestions of films and events away from the obvious and don’t forget our event Playing in the Past on 26 June. Away from the festival scene, Ken Loach’s charming Looking For Eric is released this month and it’s full of words of wisdom from none other than Eric Cantona. “He who is afraid to throw the dice will never throw a six” says the football legend. Confucius move aside, there’s a new philosopher on the scene. [Gail Tolley]

Looking for Eric also explores the intriguing character of Cantona himself. Whilst well-known on the pitch and increasingly on the screen, in this film we even see the man play the trumpet (something he says he learnt during his 9-month ban). It’s one of scriptwriter Laverty’s favourite moments of the film. “I love that surreal scene in the film when Big Eric armed with his trumpet and little Eric armed with his memory, stand on a council flat balcony and look out over Manchester and the world beyond. I find each misplaced note magical, a hymn to all those imperfect messy lives out there.” Talking alongside Loach at Cannes, Cantona revealed a love of the cinema and his desire to carry on working in film. “If I’m here today and if I’m continuing to shoot films it’s because it’s a real passion for me” he says. “I stopped football at the age of thirty because I lost my passion for the game. So long as I feel this great passion for the cinema I’ll continue to shoot films. The day I’m no longer passionate about it I’ll stop and turn my mind to something else.” More specifically, he expressed an appreciation of Loach’s own work. “I love Ken’s films: It’s a Free World, The Wind that Shakes the Barley, Riff-Raff, Family Life, all these fabulous films which are real classics and will go down in the history of the cinema for ever more. I also love Pasolini’s films, it’s a completely different style, of course, but I love his films too.” It’s easy to forget that whilst well-respected in the UK, Ken Loach is held in even higher esteem in Europe where his films reach a far wider audience. This seems particularly ironic given how firmly rooted his films are in British culture and society. Looking for Eric, however, may help change that: for one the film is set to open in a greater number of cinemas than his previous films, and for another there’s a sense that with its humour and charm it will be more accessible and appealing to UK audiences than the grit and grime of much of Loach’s previous work. It may also be helped along by the charismatic performance of a certain well-known footballer, philosopher, actor and now trumpet player, Eric Cantona. Looking for Eric is out on the 12 Jun www.lookingforericmovie.co.uk/

24 THE SKINNY June 2009

Also at both the Cameo and Belmont is a chance to show you care about the environment by supporting World Ocean Day. 8 June is that day, and both cinemas are screening The End of the Line, Rupert Murray’s documentary about the fishing industry and the consequences of over-fishing to meet our dietary demands.

the end of the line

In Glasgow, June is the month to don tuxedos, drink martinis and tell every potential archnemesis your real name. The GFT starts its James Bond season with Dr No on 7 June, and every Sunday will screen the next in the series. The CCA in Glasgow is hoping one of their nights will become a regular occurrence. Skyline 9 - A 12 Stars Event is the first in the possible season, fusing music, performance and film into one mixed media night on 19 June. As well as live music and previews of Richard the First by 12 Stars there is a chance to see the short film Disappointment by the Australian collective Unreasonable Adults. Finally, don’t really forget about the Edinburgh International Film Festival, now in its 63rd year. From 17-28 June Edinburgh is where it’s all happening. As well as the expected vast selection of films there are many special events, including a rare chance to share an audience with Darren Aronofsky, director of Pi and The Wrestler, and legendary B-movie producer and director Roger Corman, who is the focus of this year’s retrospective.[Becky Bartlett]

The Highs, The Lows and The Gore We came, we saw, and gore and horror conquered. Gail Tolley brings you the most talked about films from this year’s Cannes Film Festival. CANNES has always been the source of some of the best movie gossip: hundreds of films, scores of stars and 4000 journalists make for a heady mix. It’s also the place that shows the biggest films first and where the international press are renowned for not holding back on giving their very honest opinion as the credits roll (whether it’s boos or cheers). Here’s our selection of the films that caused some of the biggest buzz at this year’s festival. Lars von Trier and his disturbing film Antichrist could perhaps be honoured as the most talked about of Cannes 2009. A couple take a trip to their woodland cabin following the death of their son, only for paranoia, grief and the force of nature to combine with gruesome consequences. With scenes of graphic sex, violence and genital mutilation you might not want to watch it whilst eating. What many journalists (including this one) found most horrifying however was the underlying misogyny of the work, where the ‘evil’ of the story is entirely entwined with femininity. Were it not for this, some of the film’s more experimental aesthetics (extreme, out of focus shots and inventive woodland imagery) would be likely to garner greater praise. Away from the gore, although not the violence, was Jacques Audiard’s outstanding prison drama A Prophet. If you’ve seen the director’s previous film The Beat that My Heart Skipped, about a gangster torn between the criminal underworld and his ambition to be a concert pianist, you’ll know Audiard’s skill at combining human emotion and dramatic subject matter in a slick and genuine way. A Prophet is even more

accomplished, perfectly paced and with a momentum that is kept up throughout its 150 minutes. Korean director Park Chan-Wook continued the trend for blood and violence with his surrealist vampire flick Thirst. Despite being more than 10 years in the making and having a strong opening sequence the film runs away with itself in the last third to become increasingly more bizarre and silly. Unfortunately the tightness of Oldboy hasn’t made it through to ChanWook’s latest. Bright Star provided a pleasant respite from all the blood and violence in the form of a gentle and

touching story of the relationship between John Keats and his neighbour Fanny Brawne. Jane Campion (winner of the Palme D’Or in 1993 for The Piano) makes full use of the luscious English countryside to tell this tale of poetry and love, without falling into cliché. Although according to one American journalist I overheard, “it could have done with a sex scene”. And finally, one of the most impressive British films to screen at the festival was Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank. Her Glasgow-set debut feature Red Road marked the arrival of a unique voice in British cinema and her follow-up is equally powerful. It explores the

life of a 15-year-old Essex teenager whose emotions are thrown into turmoil when her mother brings home a new boyfriend. The lead performance by Kate Jarvis (who was discovered on a train platform arguing with her boyfriend) is particularly compelling too. It’s great to see that Fish Tank will also be coming to Edinburgh for the film festival in June, definitely one to get tickets for. YOU CAN READ MORE OF OUR COVERAGE FROM THIS YEAR’S FESTIVAL ON THE FILM BLOG AT WWW. THESKINNY.CO.UK

School of Arts & Creative Industries

CREATIVE SHOWCASE

Wednesday 10 – Sunday 14 June 2009 ROXY ART HOUSE, 2 Roxburgh Place, Edinburgh EH8 9SU

The School of Arts & Creative Industries will be hosting a Creative Showcase of work by 2009 graduating students including: • An exhibition from BDes (Hons) Product Design, BDes (Hons) Interior Architecture, BA (Hons) Photography & Film, MA Creative Advertising, MDes Interdisciplinary Design and other programmes across the school • Film screenings from BA (Hons) Photography & Film graduates • Music recital from BMus (Hons) Music graduates • Book launch by Dr Bashabi Fraser • Open days for Post-graduate courses and Schools and Colleges.

For more information and a full schedule of events, visit www.napier.ac.uk/sci School of Arts & Creative Industries rated top Media School in Scotland for the 2nd consecutive year School of Arts & Creative Industries rated 7th in Art & Design in the UK, and 2nd in Scotland Guardian University Guide 2010 Edinburgh Napier University is a registered Scottish charity. Reg. No. SC018373

Generously supported by Dunard Fund

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 25

FILM

Cannes 2009:

Film

Film Reviews New Town Killers Director: Richard Jobson Starring: Dougray Scott, Alastair Mackenzie, James Anthony Pearson Released: 12 June 2009 Certificate: 15

Last House On The Left Director: Dennis Iliadis Starring: Garret Dillahunt, Sara Paxton Released: 12 June 2009 Certificate: TBC

rr Summer is fast approaching and so is the slew of next generation horrors also known to the studios as reimaginings and known to the rest of us as rehashing. This month’s instalment is The Last House On The Left. After suffering the loss of her brother, Mari and her parents travel to their vacation home where Mari meets up with her friend Paige and they try to score some pot from local pretty boy Jason, whose family for plot purposes has just broken out of prison. The two teenage girls are then let in on the family’s little secret and then one of them is murdered, while the other is brutally raped and left for dead. Jason’s family then seek refuge at a nearby house which just happens to belong to Mari’s already grieving parents. Last House is just the usual torture porn with pretty actors you neither care about nor like.[Kevin McHugh]

During the great depression, cinema proved a fertile avenue for escapism and catharsis, with filmmakers producing some of the golden greats of movie history: we can only hope that the current recession will inspire a masterpiece or two. Until then, however, we’ll have to make do with New Town Killers, a film of confidence and ambition, but little in the way of style or ideas. Council estate lad Sean (Control’s Pearson) is forced into acting as quarry for two private bankers (Scott and Mackenzie) who hunt the poor lad through Edinburgh for kicks. A decent premise, but the ensuing chase is flat and unimaginative: just how many times can our hero leap from a window or hide behind a door? With characters behaving illogically and a plot which lazily descends into violence, we can only hope Jobson will quit the B movies and start living up to 16 Years of Alcohol. [Michael Gillespie]

www.thelasthouseontheleft.com

Summer Scars Director: Julian Richards Starring: Kevin Haworth, Ciaran Joyce, Amy Harvey, Jonathan Jones Released: 6 June 2009 Certificate: 15

rrrr If you go down to the woods today, be sure to watch out for nasty surprises. Julian Richards’ semiautobiographical award-winning horror tale has been aptly coined as Stand By Me meets Deliverance and Eden Lake as it charts the story of six 14-year-olds who bunk off school, steal a moped and head into the woods to drink beer, only to meet an adult stranger Peter (Haworth) who ingratiates himself with them. Bad move guys. There are some good plot devices; one teen is disabled and just one of the gang is a girl – it will affect the group dynamics and more importantly, their chances of survival. With a 73 minute running time, this is taut, dark, edge of your seat menace with a pivotal performance from Kevin Haworth which has echoes of Paddy Considine’s similarly riveting creation of a troubled adult in Shane Meadows’ Room for Romeo Brass. A salutary rites-of-passage tale with a bravely unorthodox ending.[Matthew Arnoldi]

More film reviews

online theskinny.co.uk

Last Chance Harvey Director: Joel Hopkins Starring: Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson Released: 5 June 2009 Certificate: 12A

rrr Divorcee Harvey Shine (Dustin Hoffman) is on the verge of losing his job and due to fly to London to attend his daughter’s wedding. Juggling work and family and at risk of losing both, he bumps into Kate Walker (Emma Thompson), an air stewardess whose life is plagued by unsuccessful blind dates and a paranoid mother who thinks her neighbour is a serial killer. The two strike up an instant rapport but each other’s personal lives threaten to prevent what could be a beautiful relationship. Last Chance Harvey has its feet firmly entrenched in the conventions of the romantic comedy and as a result feels rather formulaic. However, it’s elevated above most of its genre counterparts by the two lead performances; not only is it a joy to watch these talented and established actors together on the big screen, it’s also refreshing to see an alternative to mainstream cinema’s obsession with youth.[Gail Tolley]

Telstar Director: Nick Moran Starring: Con O’Neill, Pam Ferris, Kevin Spacey, Ralf Little, Tom Burke Released: 19 June 2009 Certificate: 15

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Telstar is the biopic of legendary 60s music producer Joe Meek, who from a tiny studio above a shop in London’s Holloway Road, produced the top-selling pop hit Telstar with The Tornadoes. Nick Moran’s feature debut, an adaptation of his own play, shows that success in the music business can be both fickle and precarious. Produced by Crystal Palace’s Simon Jordan, the film charts Meek’s partnership with songwriter Geoff Goddard (Burke), explores his homosexuality and later shows how paranoia took over. It’s an anarchic mix, blending cameos like Justin Hawkins as Screaming Lord Sutch, JJ Feild as temperamental star Heinz, and an underused Kevin Spacey as producer Major Banks. The film packs a lot into what amounts to a visual assault on the senses that doesn’t always allow the humour to come through. It’s entertaining though, with moments of raw emotion. Con O’Neill is excellent as Meek, and it will appeal strongest to those with an interest in this maverick musical genius. [Matthew Arnoldi] www.telstarthemovie.co.uk

26 THE SKINNY June 2009

BOCCACCIO ‘70

DRIFTING FLOWERS

BEFORE STONEWALL

DIRECTOR: MARIO MONICELLI, FEDERICO FELLINI, LUCHINO VISCONTI, VITTORIO DE SICA STARRING: MARISA SOLINAS, ANITA EKBERG, ROMY SCHNEIDER, SOPHIA LOREN RELEASED: 1 JUN CERTIFICATE: 18

DIRECTOR: ZERO CHOU STARRING: PAI CHIH-YING, SERENA FANG, YI-CHING LU RELEASED: 8 JUN CERTIFICATE: 12

DIRECTOR: GRETA SCHILLER, JOHN SCAGLIOTTI STARRING: ALLEN GINSBERG, RITA MAE BROWN, ANN BANNON RELEASED: 22 JUN CERTIFICATE: E

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rrrr Buttoned down Catholicism and the resulting itch to unbutton everything: 60s Italy is the setting for Boccaccio ’70, with four of the country’s most celebrated auteurs casting eyes over the era. Monicelli’s newlyweds can’t reveal their status or she’ll lose her job. Everything about their life is crowded, and now, two may become three. Much lighter is Fellini’s tale of a prude’s war on Ekberg’s 40D bust, and his shock when enormous Anita declares war right back. Visconti gives us Pupe. She married for money, but now her Count and his call girls are splashed across the front pages. Segueing into a perpetual flirting motion, she pulls out unexpected stops to win back her man. Then, de Sica presents Sophia. Poured into her pencil skirt, she’s the sexiest thing to hit Lugo, and the men folk are desperate to win the local raffle. The prize? A night with Sophia. At three hours long, this trip goes all round the casas, but it’s well worth the ticket.[Cara McGuigan]

Women in love with women is a subject not often touched on in the west, but Asian cinema has been far more successful. The award winning Taiwanese director Zero Chou’s second lesbian feature is a loosely connected collection of three story threads about women in love with women; covering puppy love, life after love and coming-of-age. Chou’s gift for creating dreamlike and often beautiful images is clear, but here she tries too hard to make the individual stories exotic and unique, in the process losing something important. While there are moments of humanity, it’s incredibly frustrating in a film that looks this good that the characters don’t feel like ordinary people, and the situations are so contrived as to be completely unbelievable. Wasting a chance to challenge stereotypes and gender roles, it’s sadly more a dreary series of arthouse wankbank vignettes. As a piece of art this is passable, but at providing genuine and meaningful depictions of human love it fails completely.[Scotty McKellar]

The Stonewall riots in 1969 were a turning point for the gay movement in Western society, and lead to the beginning of pride marches and increasing visibility and acceptance for homosexuals. Before then, however, it was dark times indeed. Through personal interviews and archive footage, Before Stonewall chronicles the American gay experience from the 1920s onwards, a revealing insight into a time when there was no visible gay presence in society and individuals were seemingly isolated and alone. It’s fascinating stuff, filled with fantastic and inspiring real life stories, particularly regarding the often-overlooked lesbian movement. Something so all encompassing, however, is almost inevitably going to suffer from a lack of focus. Also, an exclusively American viewpoint and occasionally dry material make it less accessible than similar features. But the quality of the interviews and personal reflections of activists and people just trying to live their lives shine through. Thank God for Stonewall and the bravery of the people who put everything on the line for liberty and love.[Scotty McKellar]

ELECTRA GLIDE IN BLUE

BELLE TOUJOURS

ARIA

DIRECTOR: JAMES WILLIAM GUERCIO STARRING: ROBERT BLAKE, BILLY GREEN BUSH, MITCH RYAN RELEASED: 22 JUN CERTIFICATE: 18

DIRECTOR: MANOEL DE OLIVEIRA STARRING: MICHEL PICCOLI, BULLE OGIER, RICARDO TRÊPA RELEASED: 22 JUN CERTIFICATE: 15

DIRECTOR: VARIOUS STARRING: JOHN HURT, TILDA SWINTON, BRIDGET FONDA RELEASED: 15 JUN CERTIFICATE: 18

rrrr

Electra has that Lynchian effect of making you wonder exactly what drugs the director was on. Nothing about it makes much sense, but it looks good, in a CHiPs in the desert kinda way. Johnny Wintergreen (Blake) is an undersized, oversexed traffic cop in Arizona’s Monument Valley; a place so hot and dull that bickering and hippy-baiting are the principal police pastimes. Johnny’s big ambition is to become a detective: to wear a (small) brown suit and a Stetson and get paid to think, not get calluses on his ass. His opportunity comes with the Charles Addams-style ‘suicide’ of local yokel Frank. But will detecting live up to Johnny’s dreams? Disjointed, hammy, melodramatic and ridiculous, Electra feels like a white trash blaxploitation film. Two particularly bizarre standout moments are the unexpected hair band, and the budget-breaking motorcycle chase (slo-mo falls truly are a lost 70s art form). Electra ain’t exactly a marvel of storytelling, but it’d look damn fine playing on your wall at a party.[Cara McGuigan]

Hollywood philistine William Goldman once said that all directors lose their touch at 60, but clearly he’d forgotten that Luis Buñuel was 67 when he made Belle De Jour, to this day his most revered work and the beginning of an exemplary period in his career. That pales in comparison, however, to Manoel de Oliveira, the Portuguese auteur who here daringly gives us a sequel to Buñuel’s psycho-sexual classic at the age of 100. It would be easy to commend the director’s sheer audacity alone, but the film has much more to offer. At 65 minutes it is admittedly slight and the glacial presence of Catherine Deneuve is sorely missed, but this tale of the confrontation between an elderly Husson (Piccoli again) and Severine (Ogier, who played the other side of sado-masochism in Maitresse) is a rich piece of postmodernism. Less a sequel than an investigation of Buñuel’s themes, there are angels, classical art, a digital rooster (!) and the most intense dinner table sequence since Close Encounters.[Michael Gillespie]

Aria producer Don Boyd could never have anticipated that twenty-two years after his film’s release, multiplex cinemas would be screening pristinely filmed opera performances to packed houses. But then maybe projects such as those have much to do with this: ten short films by ten renowned directors giving their take on a classic opera piece, Aria triumphs and suffers in the way that all portmanteau films do: yes, it’s a hit and miss affair. The low points (Robert Altman’s overlong gaze at an unconventional audience; Bruce Beresford’s soft-focus cheesecake; Julien Temple’s bedroom farce), however, are outweighed by the good stuff: Nicholas Roeg’s witty and masterfully constructed assassination tale; Franc Roddam’s Vegas tragedy; or Ken Russell’s Nessun Dorma, which should obliterate all memories of a weeping Paul Gascoigne forever. Though occasionally reliant on MTV aesthetics, the film has aged surprisingly well, and while it can be esoteric and even pretentious (you know who you are, Monsieur Godard), it’s also moving and endlessly re-watchable.[Michael Gillespie]

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JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 27

FILM

DVD REVIEWS

Peer Gynt comes South

Michael Cox looks at the East Coast's force from the frozen north. “It’s a play that I’ve always been fascinated by,” says Dominic Hill about Henrik Ibsen’s controversial play Peer Gynt. Originally produced at Dundee Rep last year, the production won much acclaim from critics and audiences alike and went on to win a number of CATS awards. It has been revived, performing at London’s Barbican before embarking on a Scottish tour. If anything, the play is infamous for being a rather difficult one to stage. Most modern audiences probably know it best as a running gag in Willy Russell’s Educating Rita. Gynt is also not the style of play usually associated with Ibsen with its use of the fantastical and the absurd, a running time of three hours and a great span in time and locations. For Hill, the most difficult job of staging the play came in creating an interesting concept. “Once I’d had the idea about a community to set [the play] in, the idea of a small town in Scotland, quite cut off, quite insular. The idea of someone ... who is a sort of fantasist and is destined to escape. The play then seemed to make sense.” But Hill wasn’t interested in doing a ‘classic’ version of the play, which he consistently called “fascinating” and “frustrating”. “The play seemed very modern and accessible for an audience, and it had a broad appeal.” In speaking about his vision, Hill was clear in his desire to create a production that was modern and relevant. “I was very keen that the play wasn’t sort of seen as cutesy and rustic. I was keen that we did something ... that felt much harder and harsher and more immediate and gritty.” He also wanted to make sure that his production focused more on the story and less on the satire that Ibsen was making on his contemporary Norway. To bring the play to a new audience, Hill wanted to ensure that the translation not only felt modern but encompassed his concepts. He selected writer Colin Teevan, with whom he had worked before. Hill was attracted by Teevan’s previous adaptations of classic plays and that he was a working poet. “He’s got a great sense of humour and likes working on a large canvas.” “I knew it quite well,” says Teevan of the original Gynt. “I’d looked at it a few times. It hadn’t really occurred to me. It’s not something you would do ‘on spec’. You’d have to know who you were doing it for.” In speaking about the assignment, Teevan says that Hill told him to write a new version that was “epic and modern and yet true to its classical roots.” Teevan appreciated the play before embarking on this new project, but his assignment soon gave him new-found respect. “One of the thrilling things about Peer Gynt is the way it mixes the naturalistic with the fantastical and the Freudian. It really has everything in there. And it was great fun to revive not only [Ibsen’s] opinions but to put some of the sexiness back in, which has been lost.” Taking Hill’s desire of anchoring Gynt to small-town Scotland in a modern way, Teevan began work. “All of the changes came about as a result with

just applying the notional logic that Dominic initially came up with. Things like looking at the nature of modern celebrity and asking ‘what would a troll be today?’.” Though Hill was very clear in the temperament he wanted the play to be, he still gave Teevan the freedom to create his own version. “Dominic didn’t want an adaptation, he wanted to stick quite closely to Ibsen, but for it to sound new in a way while still being Ibsen.” Teevan let his imagination run wild, finding ways of updating Ibsen’s original concepts and incorporating music and songs into the narrative. Though Hill worked with Teevan in polishing the script prior to rehearsal, Hill still trusted Teevan with his own ideas. In speaking about the free reign Teevan had, he says that “it was lovely being trusted” while Hill called Teevan’s work “fantastic”. When the play originally went into rehearsal, the creative team had nine weeks, allowing ample time to make discoveries, changes and cuts. Throughout the rehearsal process, Hill and Teevan worked hard in making Ibsen’s problematic fourth act work. Originally set on a ship, the action was transferred to an airplane, keeping with Hill’s desire to keep the action modern. In speaking about the execution of the section, Hill says, “The original concept used video and cameras, but most of it got stripped away throughout rehearsal.” The current revival has given the creative team the opportunity to make further changes, but instead the production is virtually the same, with only a few slight changes. “Maybe it’s a little bit clearer now,” says Hill in speaking about how the production has actually matured. In considering that there has been a slight change in tone and depth, Hill further states that, “Maybe it’s a little bit darker than it was before.” Teevan concurs with Hill, adding that he had only rewritten two tiny sections for clarity and had only cut two other lines. “And yet it is a couple of minutes longer.” Teevan also mentioned that there had been some modifications in the staging due to the different venues the production will visit but that he looks forward to seeing how audiences in different cities will respond. Hill also expressed gratitude at how popular the production has become. “I think that it attempts to be a large, great piece of popular epic drama. It has a lot of music in there, some of it live, a little bit of audience interaction. It’s so mad and wild and goes through so many kinds of tones and locations that the idea was always that we’d give the audience a kind of extraordinary experience, a sort of three-hour journey. And I think that that is what we succeeded in doing, and that’s why audiences have responded to it.” His Majesty’s Theatre, Aberdeen 2 Jun - 6 Jun; Eden Court, Inverness 9 Jun - 13 Jun; Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh 17 Jun - 20 Jun; Theatre Royal, Glasgow 23 Jun - 27 Jun.

Sex and Death, Live On Stage I love Mark Ravenhill’s scripts, mainly because he is so relentlessly confrontational. Back in the 1990s, when he formed a sort of dark alliance with Sarah Kane to energise British theatre with plays exposing the violent undercurrent behind our casual relationships with both sex and theatre. Extreme performance, sex, bad communication anguish and anger: it’s like my Saturday night out on Sauchiehall Street. It makes sense that Flatrate Theatre, a group concerned with blurring the boundaries between nights out and drama, between poetry reading and live art, are staging Ravenhill’s Some Explicit Polaroids. Flatrate come from the live poetry scene, shoving together cabaret and music, new writers

28 THE SKINNY June 2009

Manuel Harlan

Theatre

A Rank Outsider:

and actors. Having used Facebook to build up a profile, their Intial Itch nights have been scratching at the sore for a while: this revival ought to leave a nasty rash. On a more cheerful celebratory note, this month sees the Critics Awards for Theatre Scotland hand out the plaudits for home-grown theatre. Nominated companies include Skinny favourites Vanishing Point and David Leddy, and the presentation at the Edinburgh Festival Theatre brings together stars and critics, audiences and promoters over buffet and booze. It might not challenge the Oscars for emotional thanks to God, but it does provide a handy guide to the ascendant forces of Scottish theatre. [Gareth K Vile]

Top Five: Theatre Events WAYNE TRAUB 4-6 June 7.30, Tramway, £12 An archaeologist looks for Salome; a hard man secretly films his sex life; an exorcist ready to beat the devil; beautiful nuns. All brought enthrallingly to life through multimedia. THE DUCKY 10-13 June 8pm, Traverse, £8 DC Thompson follows up The Wall with more scenes from small town Scotland. CRITICS’ AWARD FOR THEATRE IN SCOTLAND 2009 14 June 5.30, Edinburgh Festival Theatre, £15 Not a show, but the only place to schmooze with the stars of the stage.

I MISS COMMUNISM 24 June 7.30, Brunton, Edinburgh; 25 June 7pm, Lemon Tree, Aberdeen, £14.50 The Best of the Best of the Fringe Award 2006: from Croatia, Ines Wurth’s autobiographical monologue talks about her childhood in Tito’s Yugoslavia. VISION/ARIA 11-13 June 7.30, Tron Love dissected through Barthes’ fragmented commentary on The Lovers’ Discourse. Just another Scottish company fusing the intellectual with radical stagecraft and intense passion, then, to create an immediate visceral response on the stage.

Scottish Opera’s Manon Nicole Hepburn looks forward to a season of exotic and opulent opera.

THEATRE

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AS Cosi fan tutte opens to rave reviews at the Theatre Royal, Glasgow, what else have Scotland’s opera audiences got to look forward to this season? Alongside Cosi fan tutte, one of Mozart’s most famous and most performed operas, Scottish Opera will perform Jules Massenet’s feted French opera Manon, a first for Scottish audiences. Not just a Scottish premiére, Manon is also one of Scottish Opera’s largest and most lavish productions to date. Featuring 63 performers on stage (including six Baroque dancers), 67 members of the Orchestra of Scottish Opera in the pit, as well as 165 costumes, 85 wigs, 75 hats and headdresses, 6 giant bird costumes and amongst other things, around 250 metres of French lace, Manon requires an enormous commitment from the entire opera company. “Manon is a massive opera”, admits Australian mezzo-soprano Catriona Barr, who plays Javotte. “Putting a show like this together would stretch the resources of any company and I suspect that is the reason why it hasn’t been done before.” Director Renaud Doucet promises a traditional interpretation of the opera - faithful to the romantic and emotional score, set in the 18th century, and topped off with a dazzling set and array of fabulous costumes. “The stunning costumes designed by André Barbe are all period eighteenth century with masses of embroidery and enormous bustles,” commented Catriona. And all this extravagance doesn’t come without its pitfalls, she explained. “It was a bit tricky learning to move in the costumes, the skirts are so huge we have to go through doorways sideways.” Manon is the tale of Manon Lescaut, a naïve young girl, whose head is turned by the promise of a more

exciting life just as she is about to enter life in a convent. Catriona plays Javotte, described as an actress but appearing a little differently. “In reality Javotte, Pousette and Rosette are prostitutes who move from lover to lover. Javotte is always up for a laugh and it has been great fun playing the role with fellow ‘floozies’ Sarah Redgwick and Louise Poole.” As a mezzo Catriona is often called upon to play the role of a boy, so Javotte is a real departure. “I have been used to striding around the stage, so this role has taken a bit of getting used to. But I am enjoying finding my flirty feminine side.” French soprano Anne Sophie Duprels will sing the title role of Manon in her début with Scottish Opera. International tenor Paul Charles Clarke returns, and Scottish Opera’s Music Director Francesco Corti will conduct. Catriona’s insider’s tip is to listen for “Adieu, notre petite table” sung with heartbreaking intensity by Anne Sophie Duprels in Act 2. “Manon is an extravaganza and a great way to beat the global economic blues,” concluded Catriona. And with Scottish Opera’s tickets for £10 if you are between 16-25 you have no excuse not to join in with what promises to be one of this year’s biggest musical spectacles. COSI FAN TUTTI: 11-13 JUNE , HIS MAJESTY’S, ABERDEEN, 01224 641 122 19, 21, 25, 27 JUNE ,EDINBURGH FESTIVAL THEATRE, 0131 529 6000 MANON: 12 JUNE, HIS MAJESTY’S, ABERDEEN 20, 24, 26 JUNE, EDINBURGH FESTIVAL THEATRE

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JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 29

Theatre

Previews Quadrophenia King's Theatre, Glasgow, 2 – 6 Jun His Majesty’s, Aberdeen, 18 – 22 Aug

Every now and again, an album of epic proportions comes along and changes the way we see things. For many, Quadrophenia, the 1973 The Who album, did just that, and still holds great meaning for generations of fans. Not only was the album made into a film in 1979, it is now, finally, nearing its stage debut, a spectacle which has been almost 16 years in the pipeline with music, lyrics and concept originally by Pete Townshend adapted for the stage by Jeff Young, John O’Hara and Tom Critchley. Boasting a nine piece band who Young admits “play the music to perfection”, and four young actors portraying the different emotional elements of our protagonist, Jimmy – Ryan O’Donnell, Jack Roth, George Maguire and Rob Kendrick alongside Syndey Rae playing ‘The Girl’. Young, as writer, along with the adaptation team has steered clear of the film version of Quadrophenia, instead bringing their own connection with the album to the stage hoping that new and old audiences will “have their hearts and minds moved and blown away by some of the most beautiful and exhilarating rock music of our times”. They wanted to retain a sense of originality, and say “This is what we have drawn from this music and we want you to be part of that”, using the album, the album sleeve, photographs and Townshend’s story itself as their inspiration. As a story which “runs deep”, this Rock Opera looks set to be as epic as the album itself. [Clare Sinclair] www.theambassadors.com

Touching Tramway Tongues

Balgay Hill Dundee Rep 9 - 27 Jun, 7.30pm. From £12

Tramway, glasgow, 12-13 Jun, 7.30pm £10

Like many Scottish choreographers, Norman Douglas has found as much acclaim in Europe as in his homeland: his work appeared at The Royal Opera House in London and he has been the Artistic Consultant for Germany’s Leipzig Tanz Theatre. He returns to Scotland, having most recently been sighted in the Gorbals working on a large scale community history piece, with three works, including two solos and music from Alfred Schnittke. Douglas‚Äô work emerges from profound intelligence ‚Äì Chora developed from Plato‚Äôs conception of the source for creativity, while another, Say It‚Äôs Not True, explores the last year of artist Camille Claudel. Not only are his works eloquently poetic, they reveal dance as the perfect vehicle for abstract ideas, without losing a wry humour. Throughout this triple bill, Douglas returns to consider how the individual survives trauma ‚Äì the duet of Chora, a world premiere, sees two dancers symbolise the battle of the divided self. Douglas‚Äô own solo, Touching Tongues, delves into the uncomfortable mind of a man and his closest love, a teddy bear. What makes this programme so vital is the energy and intellect that drives them into difficult territory, beyond language and where the body becomes fluid and expressive. It is also a celebration of a home-grown artist who proves the international importance of Scotland. [Margaret Kirk]

“Billy Mackenzie was a unique character,” says James Brining, director of Balgay Hill. “He was a local guy who could have been anything or gone anywhere, but he chose to come back to Dundee.” Balgay Hill is Dundee-born playwright Simon McCallum’s latest offering, a story about the city, fame and heroes. Featuring some of The Associates’ most famous songs, combining music, drama and video of Billy Mackenzie in performance, this production offers a unique reflection upon our society’s obsession with celebrity, centred upon life in Dundee. “Dundee is obviously important to the story”, says Brining, “It’s not known for having a lot of famous people, like Glasgow or London. Everyone knew someone who knew Billy.”

The play shifts between the 80s and the present day, and the influence Mackenzie’s music had upon the city and the wider world. This is not, however, a simple tribute to the singer and the events in his life. “It’s not just for fans of Billy Mackenzie and The Associates as it’s not a biography, it’s a work of fiction,” insists Brining. “The lives of the four fictional characters relate and intertwine with Billy, his experiences and his music.” The portrayal of Mackenzie’s life and premature death reveals the pressures of fame and of a life lived in the spotlight. The play is fragmentary, slipping between the past and the present, between fact and fiction, its unconventional form lending itself to a reflection upon the fractured, complex nature of fame. [Anna Fenton] www.dundeereptheatre.co.uk

www.norman-douglas-and-company.com

The rehearsal room

Splinters

Tron, Traverse, 1-6 jun

The Arches, 15 Jun – 20 Jun, 7.30pm. £7/£5

“Stellar Quines exists to facilitate the work of women in Scottish theatre but not at the exclusion of men,” says Muriel Romanes, their artistic director. “It is there to support and enable women to control their creative lives. It also mentors and seeks out new, exciting voices.” Part of this commitment has led to the informal, and bargain-price, Rehearsal Rooms programme. A chance to see new works in progress, it “has been going for about nine years and is our way of presenting ideas, fragments and new commissions.” Including audience feedback, it opens the doors of the company and allows the public to see works-in-progress really develop. Works under consideration include Constantina, a commissioned script from Torben Betts. As Romanes points out, Betts is an established writer. “His The Unconquered, from 2007, won the best new play award from the Critics’ Award for Theatre in Scotland.” Then there is Ana, already destined for Scottish and Canadian tours. “Ana is an international project with the renowned Quebecois theatre director Serge Denoncourt, who will be coming to workshop and direct. It will be written in Scotland and Montreal.” Aside

30 THE SKINNY June 2009

from the insight into drama’s mysterious internal workings, The Rehearsal Room is a brave project that offers audiences a first taste of powerful new work at a bargain price, an expression of a confident company entering its second decade. [Margaret Kirk] Mon 1 Jun (Tron), 7.30pm WEST WIND DRIFT by Jan Natanson, A witty meditation on man’s relationship with the sea Tues 2 Jun (Tron) and Fri 5 Jun (Traverse), 7.30pm ANA by Clare Duffy and Pierre-Yves Lemieux, Exploring the connection between depression, madness and creativity Wed 3 Jun (Tron) and Sat 6 Jun (Traverse), 7.30pm CONSTANTINA by Torben Betts, winner of Best New Play at the 2007 CATS awards Thur 4 Jun (Traverse), 7.30pm WE HAD SONG Written and directed by Catrin Evans

‘Structure and decay’ are the theme of Splinters, the first course graduation show for the Diploma in Physical Theatre led by Al Seed, the founding member of the Physical Theatre Scotland and winner of many prestigious awards. Dramatic and striking, it is broad enough to allow students to explore their own identity. Over the year students developed their responsiveness and spontaneity, studying a wide range of performance styles from Jacques Lecoq’s techniques of mime through Butoh to stage combat and puppetry. “There are recurring principles in our work: playfulness, discipline and most importantly, extending the performative ‘range’ of each individual,” explains Seed. “This involves asking the class to look at habits they have formed as performers and to disengage from them to create performances that are more ‘truthful’. Students learn quickly to work from their bodies and from their fellow performers.” Theatre, says Seed, is “an ever-morphing forum in which every element of human experience can have a place. It is also a hybrid: light, sound, music, architecture, technology, words, and every form of human action plays a part.” This is the core

of Seed’s art. The process of teaching has allowed him to invite others to assist in his research and share his professional experience. Although “a tip of a very large iceberg,” Splinters will let the audience get the flavour of the students’ experiences of physical theatre research and practice. Given a wide range of performance tools and choices, the graduates will have a great opportunity to create their own vision of “an ever-morphing forum” within the Arches space. [Agata Maslowska] www.thearches.co.uk

Comedy

Leith Festival

T H E

The Leith Festival is here again, running from 5-14 June and this year’s comedy section is sponsored by The Skinny. Here’s a selection of some of our top recommendations

COMEDY CLUB LIVE COMEDY

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jo jo sutherland, wednesday 10 jun

The Heresy Project: Kill Your God (Sunday 6 Jun, 10pm Cruz. Tickets £5/£4) God is dead! Or he’ll wish he was after Edinburghbased duo The Heresy Project rip him to pieces in their critically acclaimed and controversial show. Rick Molland and Sully O’Sullivan are two liberal thinkers so far left they’re around to the right and they’re not taking anything lying down. Homophobia, racism, they’re all for the chop. And God, or religion specifically, is on the target list. Using logic, facts and unassailable wit they ruthlessly wage a brutal assault on religion that will get you thinking, and leave God running for the hills with his sacred tail between his legs. Previously banned outright in Wales, scrapped with censors in Leicester, but had stellar reviews at the Glasgow International Comedy Festival, June’s one-night-only gig in Leith is one of the first times that the show has been performed in full in Scotland. Be there and witness history in the making: God is going down! [Scotty McKellar] Phil Buckley’s Stupid World Tour (Tuesday 9 Jun, 10pm, Cruz. Tickets £5) Us humans are a bunch of idiots a lot of the time; we just don’t like to admit it. Phil Buckley is the exception, embracing stupidity, and celebrating its usefulness as well as how damned funny it can be. He’ll happily demonstrate his own daft ventures into the stupid, unashamedly revealing idiotic acts, such as shooting at a car in Russia and insulting a reviewer in his own audience. Buckley has been roving the comedy world since 2003 and made his Edinburgh debut in 2007 with his

THE ANCIENT AUSTRALIAN ART OF GENITAL ORIGAMI stand up show Stroke the Panda. In 2008 he was a semi finalist in the City Life North West Comedian of the Year competition and his comedy just keeps getting better. Expect the good natured laughs of sharing embarrassing stories with your mates and don’t worry if he picks on you in the audience. He has assured us you’ll have to do a lot to come out of the show looking stupider than him. [Ed Whelan]

‘SOLD OUT TO THE RAFTERS… THE AUDIENCE SCREAM AND SQUEAL’ THE MAIL ON SUNDAY

Stand Up Sisters (Wednesday 10 Jun 7.30pm, Cruz. Tickets £6) One can’t help wondering what kind of strange genetic potion was concocted to produce these four unusual ‘sisters’. First, and in no particular order, there is the charismatic Jo Jo Sutherland, a finalist in the inaugural Funny Women Comedy Awards with messed up stories from the world of taking care of four children with a ‘healthy neglect’ to appearing on Wife Swap. Then there’s the volcanic Susan Morrison, small and speedy, setting audiences on fire with her wit and barely contained energetic storytelling. Next comes Siân Bevan, a cheery and clumsy oddball who’s been popping up around the comedy scene since 2004 when she reached the semi finals of the BBC talent competition. She’ll be earnestly telling stories she might have just made up inside her little head. And the mysterious fourth sister is Elaine Malcolmson, full of comedy life with a charming awkwardness and an accent that zips around the country, so keep up. Like an upside down version of Pride and Prejudice, this foursome will tempt and tickle you in all directions. [Ed Whelan] Check out theskinny.co.uk and leithfestival.com for full listings and previews.

'I JUST WISH IT WAS SOMEONE ELSE'S SON’ OUR MUMS

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June 2009

THE SKINNY 31

Despite a change of venue, Rosamund West finds the work on hand at this year's Dundee Degree Show exhilarating, unnatural, and maybe just a little bit creepy The decision to move the Duncan of Jordanstone degree show out of the college itself and into a building designed as a commercial office space is necessarily a questionable one. So much of the Dundee show’s uniqueness was informed by its environment, by the rabbit warren-like building that presented the visitor with both challenges and rewards, dispersed departments, winding corridors, bridges and apparently hidden rooms lending a sense of a journey of discovery to what could have been a mundane saunter from gallery to gallery. The underlying fear that you would take a wrong turn and end up lost forever, your petrified corpse fated to lie undiscovered until one long distant degree show, gave the whole experience a tremendous sense of adventure. This year’s relocation to the Vision building transforms that experience. Large, new spaces mean that work is presented in a much less loaded environment, although a building designed to house offices carries its own baggage leaving it far removed from the neutrality of the conventional white cube gallery. The different departments deal with this space with varying levels of success. Generally speaking, the Design subjects look better than they did before, while Fine Art rather suffers for the relocation. Tucked away on the top floor, Interior and Environmental Design have made the best use of the space (it would probably be quite embarrassing for them if they didn’t), presenting a uniformly branded display with individuals’ areas delineated in orange tape. Stand-out work here is surely that of Louise Forbes and Susan Younger, whose collaborative furniture design displays a high level of craftsmanship alongside confident, mature design and a witty approach to concept. Lamps available in large and small sizes entitled Long Schlong and Short Schlong are particular favourites. On the first floor, Interactive Media Design presents a wealth of intriguing projects from students schooled in a variety of disciplines on a course breaking down traditional boundaries between design, programming and marketing to prepare individuals for careers in a world of rapidly evolving technologies and media. Particularly fascinating is qlashr by Ryan McLeod and Ian Shiels, a “complete Video Jockey system” presented in a darkened micro-club involving 3D projections that both baffle and amaze. Fine Art does seem a little disheartened by the relocation. Each student was asked to provide details of the space required, and duly accommodated. However, restrictions set out by the building’s owners, including a ban on using the walls, mean that the soul seems to have been sucked out of the work. Temporary walls and trade-fair like spaces can work for designers, but for painters and sculptors nothing can really compare with the freedom to interact, intervene and generally fuck with a unique space in a character-filled building. Still, some artists rise above the restrictions. Katie

Until 6 Jun. www.dundee.ac.uk/degreeshow

top 5 art events in june

don't look now Sticking with the theme of all things Dundee, this month I am mostly looking forward to Scotland + Venice at the Venice Biennale. This year the Scottish pavilion is curated by Judith Winter and Graham Domke, a partnership straight out of DCA, with invigilation provided by a specially selected team of Duncan of Jordanstone students, artwork by Martin Boyce. More information of the exhibition itself will be forthcoming in next month’s Excursions special, as a crack team of Skinny art reviewers (well, reviewer) is being dispatched to the City of Love to look at art, drink Prosecco and generally waft around in a sophisticated European style. We’re

32 THE SKINNY June 2009

Watters has built her own room in the image of your gran’s living room, complete with musty floral scent and the increasingly eerie repeated strains of Clair de Lune. The effect of the environment becomes increasingly sinister as closer inspection reveals wallpaper printed with hardcore pornography, lace tablecloths delicately embroidered with images of fellatio and china figurines with additional genitalia. Particularly sinister is the bird sitting on a branch, the end of which has been altered to look like a tiny little penis. Strategically placed Mills and Boons novels contribute to an increasingly suffocating atmosphere of suppressed sexuality, a playful manifestation of what we all suspect goes on in suburbia. Naturally, the artist has already been the subject of a scandalised report in the Scotsman. Jessica Ramm, this month’s Skinny Showcase, has fashioned mixed media sculptures, lit glass bell jars with mechanical devices fruitlessly pecking against them, light bulbs intricately manipulated so that tiny moons appear within them. A large metal assemblage on the other side of her space combines the mechanism of the clock from her village hall with formed metal balls filled with the burnt remnants of her previous works, pecked endlessly by more mechanical creatures, fragments spilling to the ground in an action that seems to both mock and celebrate the wealth of experience. Jonathan Richards’ painting reveals a unique and interesting practice, although it does somewhat suffer for its environment , placed as it is on the corner of a row where others’ works can intrude and interfere. He has manipulated sheets of pure paint, built up on plastic in layer upon layer then removed and reformed into folds and creases to fill the particular space of the exhibition. The forms are reminiscent of the paintings of Alison Watt, but in the third dimension, and not boring. The manner of working seems to hold a wealth of possibilities for Jonathan. Along the back of the main Fine Art room lie the most successful displays, students granted significantly larger spaces relatively clear of outside intrusion. Omar Zingaro Bhatia’s clutter of objects, artefacts, drawings and paintings holds more to absorb than your average junk shop, while Jamie Fitzpatrick’s Unnatural History Museum presents marble and resin sculptures of weird and wonderful beasts, a semi-literal manifestation of the genetic research debate. In all, the degree show is as vast and varied as it is every year. The new location makes navigation easier for the visitor, which will perhaps lead to a higher traffic than usual. It is a shame, though, that much of the character and spirit of the show seems to have been lost in the move, and that the improvements for Design subjects have been made to the detriment of Fine Art.

photo: malcom finnie

Art

Degrees of Separation

also planning on hosting a blog written by the invigilating students on our website. In advance of the exhibition itself, what seems most interesting about the planning of the show is the emphasis that has been placed on collaborative working between the various institutions of Dundee, and the unique opportunities for career development that are being afforded to the students selected to invigilate. Without wanting to sound too hippyish, or indeed repetitive, the importance of institutions and individuals working together, providing complementary skills and nurturing new talent, cannot be underestimated. Let’s see more of that, say I.[Rosamund West]

1= EDINBURGH DEGREE SHOW & GLASGOW DEGREE SHOW

4. COMMONWEALTH SUITE COLLECTIVE, EDINBURGH. UNTIL 19 JUL

Displaying the now traditional lack of bias, we place the events in joint first position. The annual onslaught of hundreds of fresh and keen graduates is upon us.

Specially commissioned film works by Jordan Baseman and Henna-Riikka Halonen involving interviews with staff from the Commonwealth pool, and a performance with Edinburgh’s Junior Diving Club.

3.ANNUALE

5. CERITH WYN EVANS

ECA, EDINBURGH; GSA, GLASGOW. 13 – 23 JUN / 13 – 20 JUN

VARIOUS VENUES, EDINBURGH. 19 JUN – 3 JUL

More details of the programme will be released online on 1 June, but what’s already announced (Heavy Metal Mouth and sound works transmitted via Leith FM) looks promising.

INVERLEITH HOUSE, EDINBURGH. UNTIL 5 JUL

First Scottish exhibition by the world-renowned artist includes a large Murano chandelier illuminated by light pulses. Which looks quite astonishing hanging in this gallery.

Art

Metal as Medium

The Gods of Rock are pleased, as Nancy Katz finds the artists at this year's Annuale to have gone all Heavy Metal What to expect of the Embassy-run art festival as it turns six this month? A super reliable internet source profiles the developmental milestones of a six-year-old as such: they will be moving in time to music or a beat; turning towards reason and abstract thinking; fine motor skills will be sharpened, and whilst they will be growing generally more independent, they will be feeling less secure. Considering that insecurity is a vice fashioned only for those with something to lose, all in all, the emergents’ festival is looking promising. Coordinated, ambitious, and true to profile, the committee have selected a familiar, yet impressive cast of artists and curators. What’s more, Annuale has shimmied forward in the calendar year, undercutting the teeming August crowd with its wave of nonchalant part-timers, a touching act of devotion that demarks locality as a key concern. Landscape has forever played a crucial part in this annual grassroots affair. From guerilla outdoor projections to stairwell happenings, artist initiatives have infiltrated gardens, passageways, office blocks and the occasional permanent venue. In the spirit of the Annuale itself, standout exhibition Heavy Metal Mouth, a Hyperground and Polarcap co-curated group show, programmed to take place in an empty office, plays in part with a community culture specific to its national locale. Each artist will in some way examine the relationship between heavy metal culture and fine art. Hyperground curator and participating artist Alexa Hare explains, “We’re not talking Spinal Tap, but black metal, like the band Mayhem. We’re interested in the relationship landscape has to the music. Black metal fits its landscape, and it’s easy to understand how satanic metal can only be made in particular environments, like Norway or Scotland’s central belt.”

Participating artist Norman Shaw’s accompanying text piece adds, “Heavy metal culture represents an attitude which is not generally connected with fine art. Yet from cock-rock to black metal, it is an extremely nuanced, contradictory, and complex organism.” He continues, “It is a kind of anti-art with a unique identity: misanthropic, tasteless and belligerent.” With practises well versed in such thematics, artists Neil Clements and Duncan Marquiss will exhibit alongside Malcy Duff, Ben Fallon, Sacha Kahir, Masahiro Kawanaka, Rachel Mclean, Emily Ritchie, Eddie Summerton and Andy Wake. Sound, video and wall works will fill 2,000 square feet in a space akin to a level of the old Venue. “When you go to the exhibition, I want it to feel like you’re going out”, enthuses Hare. “The whole show is going to have a club feel, and we’ll have bands at the opening”. Considering its scale, perhaps the most striking aspect of this planned exhibition is that it in no way feels contrived or forced. There is something incredible in its ease of connectivity; the group has evidently tapped an exceedingly rich cultural source. It is genuine musical interests and shared experiences that drive the selection explains Hare: “We’re also interested in the relationships between black metal and other forms of music, like minimal techno, free jazz and some psychedelic music.” Exemplary of the importance of artist-run initiatives in unearthing and perpetuating community culture, Heavy Metal Mouth sounds genuinely fun, and just a little raw. As Shaw so eloquently suggests, “These artists draw new metal ores from distorted rock”. Heavy Metal Mouth is open 27 Jun www.annuale.org

The new issue of Scotland’s best film, music and culture magazine is out now

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www.productmagazine.co.uk June 2009

THE SKINNY 33

Once crowned indie rock's most industrious artist, Spencer Krug has firmly planted his eggs in one basket. Billy Hamilton catches up with the Sunset Rubdown frontman to find out why

DAVID HORVITZ

MUSIC

Dragonslayers in dressing gowns

SPENCER Krug is not a happy man. Constantly referred to as the music industry’s hardest working artist, the Sunset Rubdown vanguard‘s a little vexed by references to his bee-like productivity: “I’ve seen a couple of things written that say I’m hell-bent on taking over indie rock and that’s just bullshit,” he bemoans. “I’m just putting my efforts into music, who cares what moniker it’s under?” Despite his protests, Krug has overlooked the salient point: it’s not the conveyor belt of song that so intrigues, it’s the quality of the execution. Over the past two years, the Montreal-born Krug has been the cardinal cog in long-players by Wolf Parade, indie rock supergroup Swan Lake (twice), Frog Eyes and his own pet-project, Sunset Rubdown; each record is a testament to his unwavering capacity to coax melody from almost any environment. But a tuneful ear is only part of the allure. Central to Krug’s success thus far - and for success read unrelenting Pitchfork adulation - is a flair for percolating verbose allegories through wonky, off-kilter melodies. Overzealous Wolf Parade devotees champion the floridity of his purple prose like Smiths fans do

Morrissey’s, anointing him an ivory-tinkling Faulkner for the 21st century. Krug, however, is less rhapsodic about his song-writing proficiency. “By no means am I a poet or a great lyricist, I just like to include some sort of beauty in the lyrics,” he says. “Sometimes I’m trying to make them more straight-forward, but it’s still in me to return to the metaphor and I’m not very good at it. My friend Dan [Bejar – aka Canadian solo artist Destroyer] is one of the few people who can pull off poetry and music at the same time. The imagery isn’t anything complex. I’d like to get to the point where I could create something like that, without hiding behind metaphors. I’m my own worst critic, right?” He is. Krug’s sentences are blushed with self-deprecation and reticence, the words punctuated by carefully considered, painful pauses. It’s as if he’d rather be anywhere else than here, talking about himself and his music. Which, it turns out, he would: “Interviews are a weird undertaking. I just think, why not put on the record? It should speak for itself,” he rues. “That’s my purest form of communication... anything I have worth sharing I put into the record. I still don’t get

GRUFF RHYS: REGARDING THE COVER You know the story: The effects are all about chicken blood, the plot's riddled with cliches and the dialogue’s been lifted off the back of a Space Raiders packet. But the fact is that B-movies are 'kin ace. Here, Gruff Rhys, a notable fan of the B-movie aesthetic (look up the video to Run-Away for most recent evidence), recollects his first encounter with the genre... "There's a Welsh language horror film that I first saw when I was five years old called Gwaed ar y Ser, which translates to Blood on the Stars. It's kind of a Wicker Man meets Celebrity Big Brother come slasher movie about this group of sinister kids going around killing the minor celebrities of Wales in the 70s, occasionally with snakes. They kill the leading harp player by electrocution by connecting her harp

34 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

to the mains; they blow up the most famous rugby player by putting a bomb inside the ball... I think they blow up Barry John, he’s a rugby legend! The light entertainment TV personalities I used to see on telly every day were being murdered in front of my face, I had to be carried out of the cinema screaming. Now that’s a B-movie. I mean, it’s beyond B-movie. Maybe it’s a C or D. I got a copy of it a few years ago, it hasn’t really been shown anywhere since 1975 or 76 and it’s still incredible." SUPER FURRY ANIMALS PLAY FAT SAM'S STAGE AND DJ THE RIZLA ARENA AT ROCKNESS, DORES ON 13 JUNE.

self-promotion, I mean I get it - people are just trying to make money, right?” He’s right, of course: the music industry is an insatiable cash-hungry beast that pillages pockets with no concern for the fall out. But with release of Sunset Rubdown’s third long-player, Dragonslayer, Krug appears to have opened up the doors to commercial appeal. The histrionic canticles that rendered Random Spirit Lover an acquired taste have been supplanted by rampant flurries of riff and bass, while the creaking, medieval production has expanded to encompass a glooping honey pot of instrumentation. Dragonslayer could be the record that finally pushes Krug from indie spotlight to mainstream limelight. Not that he’s giving much credence to the prospect: “If any of the three records were commercially viable it would be this one - but I don’t think it is,” he says. “That’s not a good or a bad thing to me. It’s not in the process at all – we just made what we made. We’ve essentially tried to make pop songs, knowing that we couldn’t do it. I don’t see it being a great commercial success, it’ll probably divide people and make a lot of old fans angry and maybe it’ll attract a few new ones.”

This new direction coincides with a collective emphasis on song creation. For once, Sunset Rubdown has more than one man calling the shots: “It’s turned very much into a collaborative band – they’re not just hired guns,” explains Krug with a hint of relief. “I’m still the principal songwriter. I bring my ideas to them and then they add their own colours and flavours to them and it becomes Sunset Rubdown. If I was to sit down and record with just a piano and a guitar it sounds all right but it makes me miss the band.” With Wolf Parade on an extended sojourn and Swan Lake all but defunct, Krug’s eggs are, for now at least, nestled in one basket. “Sunset Rubdown will be touring in the fall and I’ve got one other project I’ve got to figure out what I’m going to do with, but that’s it,” he says before wryly concluding: “I’m no more busy than I’ve ever been. It’s not like I work that hard.” SUNSET RUBDOWN PLAY STEREO, GLASGOW ON 10 SEPTEMBER. DRAGONSLAYER IS RELEASED VIA JAGJAGUWAR ON 22 JUNE. WWW.SUNSETRUBDOWN.NET

A MUSO’S TOP 10: STEVE MASON In anticipation of his DJ set at RockNess this month, Steve Mason ( AKA King Biscuit Time / The Black Affair) gives us a wee taster of the evening’s tunes, in an eclectic top ten that spans 60s garage rock, acid house, old school hip-hop, Northern soul, and, of course, some of the Fife maverick’s own material.

1. Count Five - Psychotic Reaction 2. Scream - Make Me 3. Schoolly D - Am I Black Enough For You? 4. Twin Hype - Do it to the Crowd 5. The Sharades - Dumb Head 6. Farley Jackmaster Funk - The Acid Life 7. Tony Clarke - Landslide 8. Frank Wilson - Do I Love You? 9. Black Affair - Pills 10. Jimmy Edgar - Hot Raw Sex STEVE MASON DJS THE RIZLA ARENA AT ROCKNESS, DORES ON 13 JUN WWW.MYSPACE.COM/BLACKAFFAIR

Music

A Werewolf in LA

Life rarely rained for Mark Everett, but it frequently poured. The man known as E has spent the past four years searching for answers from his heartbreaking past. Now he tells Finbarr Bermingham that he just might have found them Mark Oliver Everett’s 46 years on earth have rarely been described as ‘lucky’. Which is why I fear the worst when he calls me from his Los Angeles home. A state of emergency has just been declared in California, as the deadly swine flu continues to bleed over the Mexican border. Given his tragic history, one surely would have had the Eels frontman down as a prime candidate for infection. “Well, my beard does make me very susceptible,” he muses, unreassuringly. “Floating germs just attach themselves to it. It’s a real health hazard.” Everett - E for short - has spent the five years since his last album writing a successful autobiography and making an inspiring documentary about his father. “I guess I’ve exorcised a lot of old demons,” he says. “Swine flu isn’t worrying me so much right now.” The demons E speaks so matter-of-factly about are, in reality, anything but. As a 19-year-old, he was the one to discover the father he barely spoke to lying dead in his favourite suit. His sister, Liz, killed herself in 1996 after battling with schizophrenia. Two years later, his mother died from lung cancer. His cousin and her husband were both working aboard doomed American Airlines Flight 77 that plunged into the Pentagon on 9/11. It’s little wonder he spent ten years in therapy. Speaking to him now, though, there’s a sense of renewal in his voice. He tells me he feels “more comfortable” in his own body than he has done in a while. Could he possibly be happy? “Yes, definitely. That’s hopefully how things turn out! I guess I’m growing and changing all the time, but I’m certainly not my old self.” The documentary, Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives, saw E make a “fantastic journey into his father’s brain”. He speaks with immense pride about the film, which gave him an insight into the mind of a father he’d never known. “It really made me understand him,” he says, “and it led to me being able to forgive him for his shortcomings as a father. It wasn’t necessarily an easy thing to do, but I’m really glad I did it.” His father, Hugh Everett III, was a quantum theorist, whose many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics – in which quantum effects spawn countless branches of the universe with different events occurring in each – was only truly appreciated after he had died an alcoholic recluse. “He was too smart too soon,” E says thoughtfully, “and came up with this amazing theory. But nobody paid him any attention or gave him credit for it. He knew he was a genius, but the rest of the world didn’t.” When I tell E I have heard and enjoyed his new album, he seems genuinely pleased. Many rockstars are preoccupied with playing it cool. E just sighs and says he “feels lucky to get some sort of positive reaction.” Again, it goes back to his father, who spent his life craving approval that was seldom forthcoming. “I think that was a massive factor in the tragedy of his life.” E’s frankness and enthusiasm in conversation is surprising. Whilst his music is unflinchingly honest, he is frequently portrayed in the media as a dour and often obstinate character. “Maybe you caught me on a good day,” he suggests with a wry chuckle when asked if it’s an accurate depiction. “I guess I can be that guy, but with the new album and all, it’s nice to be in the here and now. It feels good after four years of living in the past.” The album in question is called Hombre Lobo: 12 Songs of Desire. It’s a concept album, written from the point of view of a werewolf, an idea that came to E, bizarrely, while brushing his teeth. “I was working on some other music, and when brushing my teeth one morning I looked in the mirror. I saw my beard and thought: ‘Hey, this beard doesn’t really suit the music I’m working on. Maybe I should get rid of it.’ I was just about to get cut it off and then it occurred to me: ‘Well, why don’t I make an album that suits the beard?’”

"I know it sounds melodramatic, but I think I’d be dead by now if I hadn’t had music”

The central character first appeared on the Souljacker album in 2001 as the Dogfaced Boy – the last time E sported what he describes as a “very full beard”. Indeed, facial hair is a topic never far from the conversation. “It’s sort of like talent,” he beams when probed further about his weakness for beards. “Either you’re born with it or you’re not. I was actually born with a beard, I had so much testosterone. It scared my mother.” Hombre Lobo draws parallels between traditional werewolf life in literature and “what it’s like to be an isolated weirdo in society today”. While E says he feels affiliated with both factions, the album is his least personal for a long time. Electro Shock Blues, with songs such as Cancer For The Cure, is a stunningly intimate account of his mindset at the time. On the last Eels album, Blinking Lights and Other Revelations, and strikingly earnest lyrics like “Daddy was a drunk/a most unpleasant man”, the ghosts of the past were still looming large on his psyche. Now though, he seems to have put them to bed. “The one thing you don’t feel like doing after years of writing your autobiography, making a film about your father and putting together a retrospective collection of your band’s last ten years,” he says, “is something autobiographical. You really wanna go somewhere else, you know? But that said, I often think I’m doing something in the voice of a character and years later I look back on it and it’s exactly something I was going through in my

life. But for some reason, you are unaware of it at the time. So check back with me in a few years on this one!” The aforementioned Electro Shock Blues, bleak as it may be, offered E an outlet for his misery. “I know it sounds melodramatic,” he states, straight as you like, “but I think I’d be dead by now if I hadn’t had music.” It takes little intuition to deduce that Mark Everett rarely goes for sensational scoops. “I think that if my sister was able to make music in the way I am, then she wouldn’t have committed suicide. It’s as simple as that.” His sister, Liz, took her life after a long, torturous struggle with schizophrenia and drug addiction, evidently unable to cope with the loss of both of her parents. Her suicide note said that she was “going to meet Dad in a parallel universe”. Some have speculated that Liz may have had more of an idea as to where her father’s train of thought was leading than most. Others shrug and say: “Nobody really understands quantum mechanics.” These days, E tries not to trouble himself with such conundrums. “I’m not a scientist, that much I know,” he laughs, unwilling to so much as guess at where his own parallel lives might be headed. “Man, I’ve got enough trouble trying to keep the one I’m living under control.” Hombre Lobo is released via Dreamworks on 2 Jun www.eelstheband.com

June 2009

THE SKINNY 35

Music

Rock's Most Dysfunctional Family Alternative icons Dinosaur Jr are as well-known for their tense dynamic as their piledriving music. Gillian Watson discovers the secret of their staying power, second time around When the famously fractious original line-up of Massachusetts power trio Dinosaur Jr reunited in 2005 for a summer tour, the smart money was on them being outlasted by the autumn leaves. No one, least of all bassist Lou Barlow, whose unceremonious ejection from the band in 1988 effectively ended the band’s celebrated original phase, expected that the band would make two post-reformation albums capable of going toe-to-toe with their back catalogue - the most recent of which, Farm, is set to be unleashed on an unsuspecting MP3-streaming public this month. Barlow tries not to be complacent about the group’s future: “I take it one day at a time, just to protect myself… not to really expect anything that might not happen.” Barlow and Murph, the drummer who stuck with frontman J Mascis at the beginning of Dinosaur Jr’s Lou-less phase, have had to adapt to an awkward style of (non-)communication. ”It’s kind of like family,” explains Murph. “It’s like saying, ‘Would you rather have a sister that’s more funny?’ It’s just how it is, it’s my family.” As with any family, there have been concessions and sacrifices on all sides; it took all of Mascis’s patience to put up with Barlow’s brutal public criticism of him in the wake of his sacking. The war of words culminated in the band’s chapter in Michael Azerrad’s history of US alternative Our Band Could Be Your Life, in which Barlow gave a frank interview that painted a painfully graphic picture of the dysfunction and aggression which had eaten its way into relations between Dinosaur Jr’s personnel. “It was like ‘maybe he’s gone a bit too far this time’,” says Mascis. “I wasn’t really paying attention when he was doing that before. It’s more like a family vibe, having a tantrum… I’d react by waiting for him to calm down.” To Barlow’s credit, calm down he did. The bassist, who was spurred onto his own success with lo-fi pioneers Sebadoh by the acrimonious break with Mascis, now believes that “getting kicked out of Dinosaur was the greatest thing that happened to me… A lot of the negativity in Azerrad’s book comes directly from me… It just comes off as kinda gross, and when the opportunity to do Dinosaur again came up, I jumped at it. I really wanted to put some positive energy towards Dinosaur and towards J as opposed to this chokingly negative crap I put out there.” Barlow’s will to atone for past wrongs notwithstanding, why have three individuals with such a rocky relationship chosen to continue on the reunion path? Mascis puts it most succinctly: “We just have a certain energy together. There are so many crappy bands out there. We have something special, so we might as well try to keep going.” Mascis’s belief in the project doesn’t stem from misplaced arrogance – he’s the real deal. Dinosaur Jr’s original handful of albums reclaimed the guitar solo from meat-head cock-rockers, re-establishing its ability to transcend teen wankery and to genuinely affect. Mascis’s six-string heroics never felt excessive, and the band’s economical dynamics showcased one of the steadiest rhythm sections of the period in Murph and Barlow. While the 90s post-Barlow period gave birth to a handful of solid records that propelled Mascis to college-rock fame in Nirvana’s wake, reunion touring has largely focussed on the first three albums: debut Dinosaur, the classic You’re Living All Over Me and accomplished swansong-of-sorts Bug. These albums harness the tension that threatened to destroy the band as they were recorded, creating a sound that is by

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turns terrifyingly malevolent and heartbreakingly melancholy, and which taps into the dark, blank heart of adolescent boredom and hurt in a way Kurt Cobain would exploit a few years later. “I think we’re definitely due some props for those records,” says Barlow. “They’re really unique. There was a lot of movement creatively, with what J was doing, the guitarist he became and the lyricist he was… it’s all there.” Mascis is emphatic that You’re Living All Over Me is their best, and finds it difficult to listen to acclaimed follow-up Bug. “It was a bad time for the band… just like a photo, it brings you back to that time.” Murph, however, feels that the tension was integral to the album’s creation: “When you have a lot of anger and angst and frustration, that always makes for great art… We’re still pretty angsty people. It doesn’t really go away, you just learn to tame it.” True enough, the raw, elemental power of the original recordings is still unleashed in Dinosaur Jr’s blistering live performances. The band feel that the essence of the group emerges live. “It’s a different kind of power,” enthuses Murph, while Mascis admits that “you get more of the picture” at the band’s shows. Consequently, the make-up of Dinosaur audiences has shifted in favour of younger fans, which is rare for a band of their vintage. Barlow is “amazed” by the younger fanbase, but can only hazard a guess at the reasons behind it: “Good hard rock and lead guitar – people just really love to see a guy with long hair playing guitar, and J taps into that, I guess.” Indeed, the sight of the silver-haired Mascis wringing fearsome noises from his guitar is still a powerful one. “I like playing more than I used to when I was younger,” he confides.

"There’s so many crappy bands out there. We have something special, so we might as well try to keep going” J Mascis

photo: Brantley Gutierrez

"THE WAY WE COMMUNICATE IN THIS BAND IS WITH A SHRUG." LOU BARLOW

process of songwriting, Mascis comes up with a somewhat prosaic analogy. “It’s kind of like fishing… you sit there with the guitar and hope something will come.” When it does, Mascis tends to approach his songs like a “composer”, according to Murph. “He’s hearing a lot of things going on at once, and he’s dissecting multi-tracks in his head – stuff that maybe I won’t hear until we’ve actually got it on tape.” The composing and recording process is where any remaining tension among the band members seems to surface. Murph expresses enthusiasm for recording, but describes it as “hard”; as an accomplished drummer, Mascis has a clear vision of how he wants the drum parts to sound, and Murph has to essentially ‘learn’ them. Meanwhile, Barlow has the opposite problem; as Mascis doesn’t ‘hear’ the bass parts, he has to “work in the dark a little bit”. Since the reunion, Barlow has contributed a pair of his own songs to each Dinosaur Jr record; these have to sound like a Dinosaur song in order to meet his exacting standards. Rather than bringing guitar riffs to the band, Barlow jams with Murph, and his songs grow out of basslines he produces in these sessions. Recording Farm, however, the tight deadline proved a challenge for Barlow: “We don’t really work on my stuff until all of J’s is done – we worked so quickly on this record that we were just pulling at the dregs of our energy when it came time to do mine. I had to get stuff out of Murph and J, who were just exhausted… it was seriously difficult for me.” Years of developing his own musical sensibilities in Sebadoh and later project The Folk Implosion have made Barlow an opinionated contributor: “I become more of a pain in the ass, I guess. When we were finishing this record, I felt very strongly that we could have spent more time on it. I said as much, and it was very controversial.” Mascis offers a wry confirmation. “Well, he basically said he didn’t like the lyrics – he thought I could write better lyrics and I should spend more time on them.” Would Mascis criticise Barlow’s output? “That doesn’t go too well. Murph did that on this album. That was quite a drama.” Although Murph avers that “if there was any residual tension from the early days, we wouldn’t have been able to do this at all”, Mascis believes that there is still tension – they’ve just got used to dealing with it. “That’s just our relationship,” he says. “We were never the best of friends or anything.” You can almost imagine him saying it with the trademark Dinosaur shrug. Barlow is philosophical, too: “I’m just used to being in situations where people talk about what they want to do. It’s a little different with Dinosaur, but, you know, I like Dinosaur for what it is.” What it is, of course, is the most dysfunctional and messily perfect family in rock. Dinosaur Jr’s musical and personal chemistry is complex; the indefinable element that makes their sound so unique and potent happens to be highly reactive. They’ve just learned how to keep it under control. Their newfound staying power perhaps comes from a realisation that these three very different characters ( J is as laconic as Murph is chatty, Lou is as analytical as J is instinctive) share an outlook and the common goal of sticking together as long as it still works. They just have different ways of expressing themselves. Unwittingly, as we wrap up our interview, Murph, tickled by my Scottish accent, furnishes us with an anecdote that encapsulates the chequered history of Dinosaur Jr and communication. It’s about the first time the band ever visited Glasgow. “I talked to a bunch of kids, and I could not understand anything, and I was really confused. But then we went back six months later and I completely understood. I didn’t need to do anything, my brain was working something out in my time off so that when I went back it all clicked together.” It took the original line up of Dinosaur Jr much longer than six months, of course, to adapt to their incomprehensible methods of communication, but now they understand each other, everything’s a lot simpler. Here’s hoping that this band of musical brothers, Farm-ers of a fertile musical crop in an ever-challenging climate, don’t get their wires crossed any time soon. DINOSAUR JR RELEASE FARM VIA JAGJAGUWAR ON 22 JUNE.

WHAT A MESS, WHAT A BAND Swervedriver’s Adam Franklin on Dinosaur Jr

I REMEMBER J Mascis being asked in an interview what his inspiration was when it came to making records and he said something like “I just wanna make records that I would wanna listen to”. The first Dinosaur Jr record I ever heard was You’re Living All Over Me in 1987 and it was a revelation. I’m not sure who first got a hold of it but it became a staple round ours that summer. Sonic Youth had just released Sister which was their most rocking album to date and these bands became the two that really mattered. The album seemed to free up many contrasting aspects of rock in the 1980s - it had big, noisy, melodic guitar solos for starters, but also neat melodies and arrangements. It had a kind of post-punk Cure-ish quality but it rocked like a metal record. It was vaguely Neil Young-esque in the little bursts of country-ish guitars and the disembodied, quietly sung vocal style that contrasted with the obvious volume of the amps at the time of recording. Sections of sheer noise loiter under and over parts of some of the songs. There’s mental institution howling going on in the background! I thought it sounded very much like Hüsker Dü at first but then it started to sound crazier, more unhinged. Before Dinosaur, it had always seemed like a case of never-the-twain-shall-meet. If you were a noisy, punky band you couldn’t be melodic because that would be too weedy, or if you were a melodic, jangly band you couldn’t have heavy guitars because that would be too rock. And punk bands weren’t allowed to play solos! (even though Black Flag had kind of gone jazz). Dinosaur arrived and blew all four of the barn walls down and that whole melodic-but-heavy thing became the sound to search out - somebody would come back with a record by Das Damen or The Lemonheads; Band of Susans or Dumptruck. Nothing quite like Dinosaur though. Freak Scene came next and just might have been the last great seven inch single. It came out in 1988 with CDs just around the corner but when people were still buying vinyl and it preceded the next album Bug. Freak Scene is a definitive guitar recording, much like Jimi Hendrix’s All Along The Watchtower. The Hendrix recording moves through acoustic guitars, electric lead, wah wah, slide. Freak Scene kicks off with clanging electric rhythm chords and effortlessly switches to the hardcore chug chords, back out through acoustic jazzy chords and into that distinctive fucked-up, melodic lead guitar mangling. Lyrically, things don’t so much jump out but seep into your head. There’s “rubble to sift through”, tarpits, raisans, sludgefeasts, fossils. It’s all very prehistoric. But then there’s just messed up relationship stuff - “It’s only everything standing in front of me”; “She’s my post to lean on / And I just cut her down”; “The wind that blows between us / Anyone can tell to see us”; “Hey babe / Can’t do it / Can’t put you there again”; “Trying to picture me with you / Hope we can feel enough for two”; “Sometimes I don’t thrill you / Sometimes I think I’ll kill you / Just don’t let me fuck up will you? / Cuz when I need a friend it’s still you”. We went up to London to the old Mean Fiddler in Harlesden and it was Sonic Youth headlining and Dinosaur Jr on first. We leant over the balcony looking down at the stage, checking out the amps and guitars and then they came on and were the loudest thing EVER. And they had a great swing too that has defined indie rock - the way the bass and drums interlock and the guitar strums. My Bloody Valentine’s sound changed in their wake. And God bless whoever The Dinosaurs were because Dinosaur Jr, a name forced on them, somehow sums them up, kind of goofy but damn heavy. You’ve also gotta love how, after all those years, their comeback record - superbly recorded by the lovely gent that is John Agnello - was titled Almost Ready. What a mess, what a band. ADAM FRANKLIN’S NEW SOLO ALBUM IS RELEASED ON 1 JUNE. HIS NEW BAND, MAGNETIC MORNING, RELEASES ITS DEBUT ALBUM A.M. VIA FRIEND OR FAUX ON 29 JUNE. TOSHACKHIGHWAY.COM

WWW.DINOSAURJR.COM

JUNE 2009

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MUSIC

Of course, it helps to have new music to play. “I like the new songs,” Barlow says. “It really gives you something to sink your teeth into. When we play new songs, often the energy level off the three of us will just leap.” This energy is an integral part of Dinosaur’s performance; when it’s there, they can sound as gargantuan and terrifying as their prehistoric namesake. “We’re just not afraid to get violent on our instruments,” says Murph. “Other people, if you play too hard, they get nervous or they freak out. But we can all express ourselves completely, I could kick my drum set out and [ J and Lou] would probably just be like ‘Cool!’” Yet while new LP Farm is certainly powerful, it’s a more restrained power. Mascis’s guitar histrionics sound quietly triumphant rather than agonised, and this new clarity allows his distinctive, moving melodies to take to the fore. Asked about the

MUSIC

The Boy Cried Wolf Unusual and innovative music from Scotland & beyond

Erstwhile prodigy Patrick Wolf attempts to get to grips with the driving forces and internal demons that have shaped his latest release. Paul Mitchell unravels The Bachelor's enigma

Compiled by Milo McLaughlin Pretty girls and cute animals really are the nicest things in the world – FACT. And when you combine them both, plus an utterly mad bloke, you get this month's podcast – a big furry, slightly unhinged twee-monster stomping into your life and leaving seeds in your living room carpet from which sprout smiley daffodils and the onset of spring. No more bedroom-based melancholy, no more unhelpful unrequited love, the time to rejoice in an endearingly self-conscious fashion has come! Malcolm Middleton Carry Me Malcolm is back – and his latest solo album will be his last under his own name for a while. Here he alternates spoken word musings about Lycra and ‘superpowers in the post’ with heart-tugging choruses about death and that. It’s lifted to the heights of a gospel hymn to heartache with the aid of backing vocals from King Creosote and The Pictish Trail doing what Malcy refers to as “their best Pepsi & Shirley impression.” It’s a cry for help that can’t help but make you cry. I weep, and a single tear falls into my glass of Carlsberg, increasing the alcohol content by 100 per cent. Don’t leave us Malcolm. Ambulances How Could You Leave Me Get your tie-dye dress on and skip barefoot down to the river, light up a giant spliff and realise that retro-tinged isn’t always a bad thing. Ambulances’ new album The Future That Was is pure joy from start to finish and How Could You Leave Me is a laid-back love-in that will make dreamers out of over-achievers. Is it really possible for another excellent band to come frae Fife? Apparently so. The Foundling Wheel Mixed Minds and Missteps Our own Billy Hamilton gave the Foundling Wheel’s album a thumbs up last year. It took me this long to give it a listen. Once again, I need to take myself outside and have a word, and this is the perfect soundtrack for such self-flagellation. It’s beepy, it’s insane, it’s shouty. It’s angry but clever. It makes me want to drive a motorcycle the wrong way down the motorway. Naked. Zoey Van Goey We Don’t Have That Kind of Bread It was falsely claimed that Bobby McFerrin took his own life because no-one believed he was quite as happy as he made out. But if you could record Grammy award-winning, multi-million dollar earning tracks merely by slapping your own body parts you’d be just as bloody ecstatic. The Glasgow-based popsters Zoey Van Goey attempt just that with this cheery number, the lead single taken from their excellent debut The Cage Was Unlocked All Along. LISTEN TO THE PODCAST AT WWW. THESKINNY.CO.UK OR SUBSCRIBE VIA ITUNES.

38 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

IT doesn’t take too long to note that Patrick Wolf has a very distinct sense of self. But then, it hardly comes as a shock that the musically prodigious, overtly flamboyant Londoner feels, well, different. Mercifully, that ‘difference’ does not translate as arrogance, but our brief chat does reveal the labyrinthine thought processes and rigorous analysis that attend his every move. A recent biography scripted by colourful music journalist Paul Morley shed some light on the matter. Wolf tells me: “I didn’t want to commission a journalist to do a factual piece; rather I thought it would be more fun to commission a piece of creative writing instead. That’s what we got.” Quite! The Morley ‘eulogy’ received a staggering amount of flak for what was, essentially, a press release for his latest album. “Watch him work, play and etc in a video you might come across. He. Permits you to watch. He. Studies himself. He. Is assembling himself right in front of you. He. Smashes his way through limited judgements of taste. He. Is detached from everything including detachment. He.” And so on and on. But Wolf, who commissioned what has been dubbed ‘He.gate’, is far from embarrassed, suggesting instead that the piece, and subsequent reaction, typifies his expectations of the world. “I liked the fact it was creative and innovative. Maybe it could have been worked better. Maybe people would have understood it more as say, an Observer Music Monthly article, but as a biography people don’t realise that it can be done in a different way. If I could I would have gotten William Burroughs to do my bio and God knows what that would have sounded like.” So, a mutual misunderstanding. We don’t get Patrick, and it would appear Patrick doesn’t get us. Or at least, this may have been the case up to now. At the age of 25, there are signs that Wolf is becoming less insular in his perspective, a fact he tacitly acknowledges. “When you’re younger, and you’ve been a bit of an outsider as a teenager, you certainly make an effort not to change anything about yourself. You have to stick up for, and justify your personality and your beliefs. You become extremely defensive and you put up a lot of barriers around you. I guess now, that having a good response to what I’ve done, there’s nothing to prove in terms of being accepted, so I guess I’m coming to terms with the fact I don’t have to be so defensive and spiky the whole time.” Wolf’s spikiness can be understood in the context of what he concedes was a pretty traumatic childhood. Despite being raised in a creative family environment (his mother an artist, his dad a musician) whereby he was multi-instrumental from a ludicrously early age, he suffered intense bullying at secondary school as a result of his outré persona. It becomes obvious he still carries a mistrust of society at large to cope with issues of difference such as appearance and sexuality. “It takes a lot – particularly if you’re in the public eye – to expose every part of your personality, especially when there is quite a lot of homophobia in the world still. But now I feel, ‘You know what? I can still be an inventive musician, producer and I can still look this way, and I can still sleep with men. This is the way I was born.’ I guess bisexuality, homosexuality and even feminism, are things I’m really interested in. Some people think if you’re a woman, or if you’re gay or bisexual, or look different it means you don’t have the right to be a credible musician or artist. They still think you should be on the Graham Norton show and talking about nail varnish and shit like that. It can be a bit of a fighting process to get respect from people and I realise that it probably will be like that until the day I die, but I’m not going to stop fighting until I’m on the same level as Bob Dylan. If Bob Dylan was gay I think he would have had to fight a lot harder to establish himself in a heterosexual society dominated by a heterosexual media.”

"I’M NOT GOING TO STOP FIGHTING UNTIL I’M ON THE SAME LEVEL AS BOB DYLAN"

Originally conceived as a double album, the ultimate title for both parts of his recorded output this year – the forthcoming The Bachelor (for which Morley wrote the bio) and The Conqueror (due in the autumn) – is to be Battle. And it appears that this is Wolf 's entrenched state of mind as he struggles to impose himself, to render his obvious creativity into something meaningful. “People will realise in twenty years that with each album I release I am just exploring, or focussing on a different part of my personality. I think human beings go through phases in life and they experience different mental states. I think in the case of a lot of different bands, when they do their first album they just try and recreate that for thirty years, including the way they look. That’s never been an interest of mine; I just find it creatively stifling to do that. Every album is an honest representation of where I am at that particular time. I’m a real live and let live person. ‘This is me, and this is you. You don’t quite understand me and I’m not going to get angry at you for that, but I’m going to try and help you understand it a bit better that people like me exist and have the same rights that you do.’ I think I touched on that a bit more on this album and feel more confident saying that sort of thing in order to try and inspire and ‘make the world a better place’. At the very least it should make people laugh. If that laughter then inspires people to get into my string arrangements and instrumentation choices, even better for me.” And with that, Wolf lets out a laugh before offering in parting: “That’s why I’m here.” THE BACHELOR IS RELEASED VIA BLOODY CHAMBER MUSIC ON 1 JUN

MUSIC

In Bronto We Trust

Bronto Skylift are a two-headed beast currently residing in the darkest reaches of the Glasgow underground 'scene'. Ryan Drever has a word as they prepare to record their full-length debut “AT the first practice, we knew we had a beast on our hands.” The frank words of Niall Strachan – one half of two-man crew, Bronto Skylift – speak for themselves and could not be any more true. The Glasgow-based duo are an experiment in monstrous noise and big dirty jams – which could be likened to the primal, sluggish batterings of heavier Nirvana with the experimental bent of Helmet – that are both obnoxious and intrusive enough to bore their way into your skull like a drill to the brain. When you go to see a band where one member is breaking down jazz-influenced drum fills and the other is piledriving his guitar (which is plugged into both a guitar and a bass amp) into a wall, it’s definitely something you’ll remember. The idea that some may be startled by the noise Bronto Skylift create and perhaps not quite get it, or better still, be scared, doesn’t seem to faze the band, as drummer and other half Iain Stewart explains: “If we’re playing a small venue and people have to leave because it’s too noisy or loud, that’s definitely a success. Most people seem to appreciate the energy, even if they’re not into the music.” Echoing the sentiment, Niall agrees: “We’ve found we do get quite extreme opinions on Bronto. People either get into it or pretty much hate us, which is great. As long as we’re stirring something inside we’re doing it right.” They both hail from more northern territories – Orkney for Iain, and Inverness for Niall – and the band were introduced by mutual friends. After the seemingly epic first practice, a band was born. Though Garage Function Skinny Ad PRINT.pdf

CMY

40 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

PHOTO: LISA FERRI

initially featuring a third member on bass, the band was promptly trimmed down to two which, according to Niall, seems to have worked out for the best. “For our first gig, a couple of years ago, we had someone else in, but they were too concerned with how much drink they 26/5/09

11:52:41

could have rather than concentrating on the gig, so they got ditched and we just played and enjoyed it so much as a two piece that we went with that.” It would also appear that there are no plans to change this any time soon. “We get quite a lot of requests from bass players to

join,” Niall says, “but we don’t want to mess with what we’ve got.” Besides the rigidity of their line up, the intentions and influences behind Bronto Skylift seem organic and fairly improvised. “We usually just jam whatever we have in our heads,” says Iain. “It may subconsciously be influenced by something we’ve been listening to, but we definitely don’t aim to have a certain sound.” The band both come from fairly normal yet slightly different musical backgrounds, with Iain being involved with school orchestras and jazz bands, alongsinde the odd garage effort, and Niall spending most of the time penning songs whilst holed up in his bedroom. Regardless of background and influence though, the importance lies on the band having its own identity, according to Niall. “I think it’s far more exciting and liberating to find your own sound, rather than simply saying ‘we must sound like a combination of our favourite bands’, which can work, but I think that would limit a band like us.” Alongside touring plans and playing with other bands – Iain is a member of three others – the duo are readying themselves to record a debut full-length later this year. With this much activity in the pipeline and speculation, perhaps even reputation, growing, you’d best prepare for the imminent and noisy invasion of Bronto Skylift. BRONTO SKYLIFT PLAY THE SKINNY STAGE AT GONORTH, INVERNESS WITH VCHEKA, HEY ENEMY! AND ST DELUXE ON 11 JUN. WWW.MYSPACE.COM/BRONTOSKYLIFT

MUSIC

Unicorn Kid: Levelling Up At just 17, Oliver Sabin has played the music industry to perfection, finding himself with an international following and a headline UK tour on the horizon. But this is no mere stroke of luck, as Unicorn Kid tells Gordon Bruce PICTURE yourself as a sprightly 17-year-old: what’s your greatest achievement? Perhaps you’ve convinced your teacher that your dog did in fact devour your homework. Perhaps you’ve persuaded your local offlicence that it is a real moustache. Or perhaps you’ve finally completed Mario after hours on your Nintendo. Whatever, it’s unlikely that you’ll have plugged your Nintendo into a computer, turned the bleeps and blips into a rhythm, produced CD artwork, managed to get signed, enjoyed airplay on Radio 1 and now find yourself sitting on the brink of a UK headline tour. Unlikely, but as Oliver Sabin (aka Unicorn Kid) has proved, it’s not impossible. When I speak to him at his home in Leith, his voice is held with a mixture of excitement and trepidation for the tour ahead. Sabin does not take his cue from the capital’s burgeoning folk scene as one might suspect, however. “My music follows the aesthetic of chiptune: it’s a big influence but it’s not the whole story,” he offers. “I suppose you could call me 8-bit dance”. To the uninitiated, chiptune is the result of sampling old, bashed-in computer games to make high tempo dance music. Some artists subscribing to the chiptune school of thought have been criticized for putting the concept over the music itself. I ask Sabin whether he has become as much a part of the scene as a fan of it: “I’m actually not particularly well regarded within the scene because I don’t use the same hardware. I’m not a purist, and I don’t want to be, but I can’t deny I’m not anything to do with it.”

Whether or not he’s considered a true “chiptuner” by the fanatics, his own brand of dance music has amassed attention right quick, with fans dotted around the world as far away as Japan. Just how did he achieve that without traversing the globe? “For me it’s a word of mouth thing, people adding my songs on to their MySpace profile pages or uploading to YouTube, and it’s just built organically like that. It exposes me to more people that would like me, and I work hard to message everyone back.” With over one and a half million plays, it’s a mind-boggling fanbase for an artist who is only just beginning to leave his bedroom. Despite the surprisingly modest reasons Sabin offers for his success, the huge effort he has put in to keep Unicorn Kid on the cutting edge is clear. With a constantly updated presence via his online networking platforms, it’s all beginning to pay off: “Popjustice tweeted me to ask if I wanted to remix the Pet Shop Boys, so I said yeah pretty jokingly. Before I knew it, their manager sent the parts through to my manager, and suddenly I’m remixing their next single.” This modern approach to the music industry continued to reap rewards with Popmorphic – a Glasgow-based company who have developed technology enabling the first ever interactive music video. They specifically contacted Oli to be the trailblazer of this technology with his single Lion Hat. With more than a trillion ways to play the video, and a prize of £1000 to the person who can retrieve the Lion Hat (after ten failed attempts, I wish I had played

LISA FERRI

more Nintendo when I was younger), it’s an incredibly exciting project. How did Sabin himself find the whole experience? “It was far more professional than I thought,” he confesses. “Each time it was filmed, there were 45 cameras all at different angles. This was all done last November, and I hadn’t achieved what I had in between then and now - it was a really big deal.” You get a sense that even Sabin himself is overwhelmed by his success, especially when his upcoming gig schedule comes up in conversation: “I’ve only gigged about thirty or forty times and now I’ve got a headline tour, I can’t believe it. I’m pretty crazy on stage as well so I’m gonna get tired!”

Throughout this meteoric rise, Sabin has remained surprisingly level-headed: “I’ve managed to get in to Edinburgh College of Art, so if this thing dies on its arse then I can always pick that up.” Without a doubt, by playing the music business in an ultra modern way, Unicorn Kid proves that you can accomplish great things without turning into some self-proclaimed deity, and in times like these that’s incredibly refreshing. PLAYING KING TUT’S, GLASGOW ON 9 JUN; CABARET VOLTAIRE, EDINBURGH ON 23 JUN; MOSHULU, ABERDEEN ON 24 JUN AND PJ’S, DUNFERMLINE ON 30 JUN. WWW.MYSPACE.COM/UNICORNKID

www.brokenrecordsband.com www.4ad.com

Broken Records The Skinny.indd 1

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JUNE 2009

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Music

UK Première: Carnegie Hall, East Port, Dunfermline KY12 7JA

Live music soundtrack performed by Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips (Galaxie 500, Luna) www.deanandbritta.com

Wed 8 July 8pm

Tickets £18 concession £13 Tel 01383 602302 www.attfife.org.uk www.ticketweb.co.uk

Scottish Charity no. SCO38704

DIP

Big,bad, starry-assed headliners to be announced + Adam Stafford (Y’all Is Fantasy Island)

Thursday 2 July 7.30pm - 12am Bongo Club

42 THE SKINNY June 2009

There are many artists who are praised as being ‘ahead of their time’, but Frank Zappa was eerily prophetic in his musical innovations. These are just a few of them

In an increasingly homogenised musical climate, how do you approach maintaining the legacy of a man who was, and still is, ahead of his time? Joe Barton talks to Dweezil Zappa, band leader of the Zappa Plays Zappa project, to find out how he’s keeping the memory, and music, of his father alive

Sampling

Long before the invention of the E-MU SP 1200, Zappa was swiping musical ideas and placing them into new cultural contexts; the very first song released under his name, 1966’s Hungry Freaks, Daddy, infamously nicks the riff from the Rolling Stones’ (Can’t Get No) Satisfaction. Motifs from Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring were also frequently inserted into guitar solos with gay abandon. In addition, Zappa’s studio technique of xenochrony – splicing together sections from completely different tape recordings – allowed him to create songs from drum beats and guitar licks that had originally been played in different time signatures, and, in some examples, completely different decades.

In his lifetime, Frank Zappa tirelessly produced album after album of astounding music, siphoning the profits of one project into another, in order to fulfil a commitment to his modest but loyal fanbase. After succumbing to prostate cancer in 1993, the responsibility of continuing this prolific rate of musical production has rested in the hands his family, with eldest son Dweezil leading the Zappa Plays Zappa tour, a project dedicated to both satisfying the demand for live performances amongst Zappa’s existing following, as well as bringing his music to a younger audience disillusioned by the slime oozing from their TV sets. As Zappa Jr suggests: “Anyone who has an open mind can enjoy it.” In fact, since the first Zappa Plays Zappa tour in 2006, Dweezil notes how he’s “seen a change in the ratio of fans”, and although “it’s not quite half and half”, there’s definitely an increasing number of younger listeners, implying that, in a climate of The X Factor, Auto-Tune, and nu-gaze/rave/metal recycling of genres, maybe we need Zappa now more than ever. Indeed, discussions of Zappa’s music inevitably become critiques of the conventions of the music world; Zappa himself pointed out that mindless adherence to cliché has equalled success since the days of Mozart, and, now, his son considers why this mentality has survived to the modern day. “It’s all about instant gratification,” explains Dweezil. “Somebody decides: ‘Today, I want to be a musician’, and they buy some software and take some pre-composed elements, move them around like sentences in a paragraph, and they say ‘Oh, I’ve written a song now’”. That Simon Cowell can build a lucrative business on very little musical content – consider that the result of four months’ worth of televised spectacle was a glib cover version of a Leonard Cohen song – only goes to show how, in Dweezil’s words, his father anticipated “a lot of the worst things that were yet to come”. However, before we start pointing the finger at the artists themselves, surely we the listeners are also partly to blame. Dweezil seems to agree with the idea that, while pop is great entertainment, in order to prevent stagnancy it’s important to distinguish between witnessing a real musical performance and “spending money to watch some people dance around to a backing track”. Surely this is the reason, as Dweezil observes, that his father’s records “tend to have incredible longevity for people, and a repeat listening value that other records don’t seem to have”. While he may have had long hair, Zappa was a composer, not a rock star, and his work was concerned with musical content, rather than the surface value that typifies ephemeral pop fads. With this in mind, it’s not surprising that recreating his music requires a virtuoso ensemble, and a lot of practice. For example, in order to perform Billy the Mountain, the half-hour absurdist epic from 1972’s Just Another Band From LA, Dweezil and the band had to rehearse “pretty much five days a week… for about three weeks, including learning 3000 words of dialogue.” However, due to the level of proficiency that they’d reached, the band had Billy the Mountain “up and running by the end of the first day, and only a week later, had the thing memorised”. The musical journey that Dweezil himself has undertaken since 2006 – be it learning new guitar-picking techniques in order to pull off the fiendish flourishes of The Black Page, or painstakingly renovating Zappa’s thirty-year old rack gear to reproduce that tone as accurately as possible – has seen his appreciation for his father’s work reach new heights: “I’ve always loved the music, but through intense study and performance my respect for what he did has grown exponentially.” Surely, this reflects the listener’s own relationship with Zappa’s output. As Dweezil puts it: “It changes their perspective on music in general, giving the sense that there’s something more expansive possible.” Zappa has time and again encouraged rock fans to reassess their listening habits. When rhythmically complex passages

“I’ve always loved the music, but through intense study and performance my respect for what my dad did has grown exponentially”

are contrasted with parodies of robotic disco, Dweezil suggests it defies the listener to ask themselves this: “While pop music has plenty of things that’ll get stuck in your head, will they still be something that you’ll enjoy two years from now?” Dweezil doesn’t think we’ll see a modern day equivalent to his father “anytime soon”, and for fans this means that the Zappa Family Trust is the only current provider of nutrition in a world of musical junk food. So what can they look forward to? “We’re hitting a period where a lot of records are reaching some big anniversaries, records that really have a place in history,” considers Dweezil. “I think there’s going to be some special projects that are going to be related to those anniversaries over the next few years.” Whilst Zappa himself once predicted that, rather than by fire and ice, the end of the world would be caused by “paperwork and nostalgia”, it’s unlikely that tributes to his early work would be sentimental. As Dweezil says: “Albums like Lumpy Gravy still sound as shocking today as they did when they came out”. What the repeat customers to tributes like the Zappa Plays Zappa tour demonstrate is that there’s still both a demand and a space in the industry for listening experiences that are as musically uncompromising as they are entertaining. Almost poetically – and true to his father’s original ethos –Dweezil argues that the project is making that space as accessible for public consumption as time and money will allow. Zappa Plays Zappa play The Picture House, Edinburgh on 18 JuN.

Rapping

Ignoring musicological debates about the influence of African griots or John Lee Hooker’s Boogie Chillun, Zappa’s rhythmic, spoken delivery on Trouble Every Day predates the proto-rap of Gil Scott Heron’s The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, as well as covering similar issues of civil unrest and racism in the USA. He would later note in an interview that speaking over a track, rather than singing, allowed him to express much more complex ideas than pop typically allowed for. If only 50 Cent was to have this revelation. Sequencing

Nowadays, sequencers can be downloaded for free as part of musicmaking software, but in the mid-80s Zappa had to fork out thousands of dollars to acquire the Synclavier DMS, a machine which enabled him to bring to life the works of the eighteenth century composer Francesco Zappa, simply by loading the data of his scores into a computer. Interestingly, while sequencers are now often used to produce simple techno phrases, Zappa’s initial use of the Synclavier was to create music he deemed too complex for a human to ever perform accurately. File Sharing

In 1983, within months of CDs becoming commercially available, Zappa essentially invented iTunes. In applying for a patent, Zappa proposed that it would be a good idea to “acquire the rights to digitally duplicate and store” music, making it “accessible by phone or cable TV, directly patchable into the user’s home taping appliances”. In this case, Zappa was so ahead of his time that his proposition, somewhat unsurprisingly, failed miserably.

www.zappaplayszappa.com

June 2009

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Music

Let's Be Frank

A Mother of Invention

Music

Turn Off the Bright Lights After a legendary farewell in 2004, Orbital are back where they belong at the top of this summer's festival lineups. Rosie Davies asks Phil Hartnoll what changed. “Orbital are back? Aren’t they really old now?” Orbital aren’t old. Not really. We think they’re old because of what they’ve done for us. Twenty years ago, they started fighting for the dance scene we have now. The recognition and promotion of dance as a live act, as an intelligent, politically conscious entity - when it wants to be - didn’t just happen naturally. War veteran appreciation analogies aside, at 41 and 45 respectively, Paul and Phil Hartnoll aren’t ready to be packed off to the retirement home just yet. In November last year, the Big Chill festival proudly announced that, after persistent bullying from organiser Guy Morley, Orbital would headline their main stage. “I’ve been badgering them for years,” Morley quipped excitedly. Four years, to be precise – in 2004, Orbital left the dance world stunned with a historic Glastonbury set. Now, having picked up where they left off, a full arena tour has been planned for September, as well as a handful of festival dates including Sonar, Global Gathering and Rock Ness. Music and national press salivated alike: the legendary, pioneering, superlative-ridden duo were back, and conveniently it’s 20 years since they first released Chime, a classic rave anthem still clocking up listens at after parties by people who were toddlers at the time. As Paul Hartnoll put it: “It’s not an exercise in nostalgia, the time just seems right.” They nodded excitedly, forming their perfect press releases around Orbital’s neatly symmetrical timeline. Their ten-year golden period is notoriously bookended with two seminal Glastonbury shows – their first in 1994, and their last in 2004. There’s even a greatest hits, simply called Orbital 20. Their comeback, then, heralds an appropriately timed and nicely packaged return to form; still having it, and ’avin’ it large, after all these years. The thing is, it’s not really a comeback. Paul and Phil do still ‘have it’, but they’ve proved so in their solo projects since the split. Paul has released two self-titled albums and recorded soundtracks for films and adverts, including the enviously clever Golf GTI ad with its techno soundtrack composed of car doors, horns, and squabbling spouses, a fond tribute to the now middle-aged rave generation if there ever was one. Phil continued DJing, and formed the acclaimed electronic act Long Range. So, why now? Is it really all about the Chime anniversary? “To be honest, it was the Big Chill that got us back together. It was their fault,” Phil says. “They suggested it, and that got us talking about it, and we agreed to see what more we could do with Orbital. “The idea came up last year really but Paul was doing his own projects and I was doing mine. We just didn’t have time. I was always up for it, though - it just sounds like fun.” Thing is, if reforming was always on the cards, why the fuss about splitting up? Details on their website concerning the ‘last ever’ gig at the Maida Vale studios, a seminal goodbye to the act, have had to be updated with a ‘2009 note’, stating the obvious: “This is not quite true now!” “Looking back, maybe we shouldn’t have made such a big deal about it,” Phil laughs. “It was never that we didn’t want to do it any more. Nothing has changed really, we just had a break. To be honest, it was just an excuse for a big party...” As Phil says, the act have always lived on a ‘leave it to fate’ philosophy. His catchphrase, “you never know”, litters his speech, and seems to follow any talk of his plans. There are no plans to make any more records, no promises of new directions, and no media-baiting collaborations. The shows will be indulgent affairs and, like the best parties, the aim is simply to have a good time. It was the Orbital shows, rather than the recording, which Phil missed. “I DJ quite a lot and record with other people, so it was more working with my brother and the live shows that I missed. At the moment we don’t have any plans to record new material, but we’re taking it one step at a time. We’re not against the idea,

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we just haven’t thought about it yet. You never know...” There was, however, an element of doubt. “When we actually sat down over a coffee, we realised we were both ready for it, which is important. Then I thought, do people actually want to hear us again? So we put some feelers out and people were excited about it.” Despite the media hype and adoring fans’ reaction, his tentative, apologetic outlook is understandable. The brothers are doing exciting, and critically acclaimed, new work. It all feels a little... indulgent. But, muses Phil, that seems to be the stage they are at in their lives. “I met a beautiful lady a couple of years ago. She’s the love of my life. We’ve both got three kids from previous marriages, so we’re like the Brady Bunch now. It’s probably the most fantastic thing that’s happened to me in the past couple of years. It’s quite expensive with all these little mouths to feed so my lifestyle’s not exactly the same as it once was. Will we be partying on this tour? You never know,” he says. “Let’s just say, we’re not going to bed early yet. I really haven’t changed a lot.” After the Big Chill came the announcement of Rock Ness, a decidedly Scottish, relatively new knees-up. A strange choice of ‘warm-up’ gig, perhaps, for a band who profess an almost spiritual connection with Glastonbury? “Rock Ness was arranged quite early on, but we had to keep it quiet, because we were the Big Chill’s ‘exclusive’, really. It sounded like a really good festival, a right laugh. I’ve been up to that part of the world a bit - I was in Inverness DJing with my partner [Miss Use] recently, and a mate of mine got married at Loch Ness about three or four years ago. We had a great time, so we just jumped at the thought of playing there.” It’s fitting, though, that the band are playing a festival which, without their influence, may never have even had a dance tent. When they released Chime in 1989,

"We invested in our shows and pushed the production ethic. And it worked. It proved to a lot of people that techno bands can carry it off" Phil Hartnoll dance, and techno in particular, generally had no place at festivals. It wasn’t seen as a credible live genre: it was club music, and associated with an under-class of ‘revellers’ and a very distinct drug scene. “Glastonbury 1994 was huge because at that time, most festivals were about rock ’n’ roll. Dance was seen as unimportant, throwaway and unworthy.” Paul and Phil poured their earnings into creating better and better live shows – and that included production, lighting and visuals. They worked to put

on a spectacle as well as changing the nature of live dance acts by mixing and sequencing everything live. “I suppose we were pushing that idea for a long time, from 1990 really. We invested in our shows and pushed the production ethic. And it worked. It proved to a lot of people that techno bands can carry it off.” The result was a legacy as a live act, and a sound so distinctive and of its time that just the first bar of Halcyon, say, can take you right back to techno’s 90s heyday. After 20 years of pioneering and changing the face of music – an overused cliché which is finally deserved – they have earned their position as the “timelords of techno”. The one thing Phil isn’t going to apologise about is having a good time. “Just try and stop me! I might be a little bit older but I’ve still got a bit of life in me yet. It’s the beautiful people who come along who make it what it is. It’s not about them and us; it’s like there’s these big arms, hugging everyone. The energy from the audience is sucked in and bounced back. I do tend to get a bit over excited...” If all goes to plan, a generation of nu-ravers will be joined by the people who first saw the brothers DJing in an acid house-drenched warehouse back in 1989. “There will be people who have calmed down a bit because they’re older, who will go out and go crazy maybe three times a year. I know people who do that, I know it happens. I’m hoping one of those times will be our show.” They’ve not returned to grace us with more music, a new direction, or cool collaborations. It’s to “put some fun back into it”. After what they’ve done for us, we can only treat them with respect. Orbital play RockNess 2009, Dores on 13 June. orbital 20 is realeased on 8 jun via rhino www.loopz.co.uk

Music

Surfing the Zeitgeist Setting the blogosphere ablaze with pure sun-drenched euphoria in recent months, Nathan Williams has endured - rather than enjoyed - an unlikely ascent thus far. Lauren Mayberry talks noise, porn and not really giving a crap with Wavves

When I call Wavves, the seaside moniker of Nathan Williams, San Diego native and one-man purveyor of stoner-noise-pop, he seems to have forgotten about his interview with the dear Skinny. On the fourth attempt, he answers with a gravelly drawl. “I just woke up, my head’s a bit...” Williams tails off. At first, it’s hard to imagine that this voice, laden with apathy and last night’s beer, belongs to the wunderkind being salivated about all over the blogosphere. But once you listen to Wavves, it starts to make sense. At times appearing deliberately obscure, at others pure golden surf-pop, Wavves’ music sometimes seems like an accident, but it’s never for the faint of heart. “Everyone has a different way of looking at it. I don’t know how I’d go about describing it,” says Williams. Bobbing alongside peers such as Times New Viking and No Age, with a helping of Beck, instrumental noise tracks slide between sun-spat melodies and complementary Garageband-esque production, allowing many a reviewer to hail him as the next lo-fi messiah. Only, Wavves doesn’t care about that – or much – apparently. “People ask me all the time whether the hype has had a negative impact, but in the end, there’s nothing I can do about it. If they like it, cool. If they don’t… whatever, you know?” The internet, arguably the catalyst in Wavves’ uber-hype, elicits palpable disinterest from Williams. “I go online and look up video game websites and porn – that’s about it. I hate MySpace.” Of the apparent surge in alt-noise outfits, Williams is similarly dismissive. “There are good bands out right now – Blind Dogs, Woods, Pens – but I don’t know if ‘alt-noise’ is what I’d call them, genre-wise. It’s labelling, but I guess that’s what people do.” Wavves’ sunkissed cacophony is all about nostalgia for the ordinary, and being young. “I just write about whatever – stuff I’ve been doing, going to the beach, getting bored, getting drunk, hanging out or feeling stupid. All kinds of normal shit.” So Bored, his riotous previous single, now seems to make more sense. And it also seems to be going down well. Having only been active since February last year, Wavves is about to release Wavvves, a redux version of his properly-selftitled 2008 debut, and is played the Pitchfork stage at Primavera Sound festival in May as part of his second

European tour of the year. Not bad for a formerly unemployed, 22-year-old college drop-out and selfconfessed beach bum. “Everything just came about because I was bored, working in a record shop in San Diego. I quit my job, and I dropped out of college – I had a lot of time on my hands.” Signed to Bella Union in April, Wavves seems amped to have found anyone who would put out his material, let alone an imprint so impressive. Simon Raymonde, Cocteau Twins bassist and Bella Union founder, listed Wavves as one of his recommendations for the year before any question of signing Williams arose. Accidentally impressive is Wavves all over. Soon to be embarking on an album of new material, Williams is continuing in the vein of his previous 7-inch vinyl releases that caused all the commotion, recording and producing everything himself, enlisting friend Ryan Ulsh to drum on tour. Yet, this is not a conscious choice in order to be the poster child of grassroots production or DIY. “In most cases, I would rather do it myself, because it’s just harder to explain to other people. It’s more of a comfort issue than having a certain ethic close to my heart,” he says. For all that Wavves doesn’t say during our interview, a healthy measure of irony is rolled in. “I feel like self-promotion should be all about having fun, but if it’s not, I don’t want to be doing it. It’s real cheesy when people take themselves too seriously.” Williams exemplifies this with the array of YouTube videos adorning his MySpace profile – Kate Bush, a surreal cartoon by skull-emblazoned US skateboard company Powell Peralta, and the Olsen twins (“That video is amazing, are you kidding?”). As for current endeavours, Williams is staying on the road: “I’m basically touring for the rest of the year, then taking time off to record this new album and hang out.” Maybe the professional slacker act is just that – or maybe it’s not. If you asked Williams, the response would, in all likelihood, be a sigh, shrug and uttering of nonchalance – but at least you can’t say it’s all gone to his head. Wavvves is released via Bella Union on 1 Jun. Wavves plays Captain’s Rest, Glasgow, on 25 Jun. www.myspace.com/wavves

June 2009

THE SKINNY 45

RECORDS

THE DIRTY DOZEN

Plenty of new music in the D-12 sack this month, but Nick Mitchell finds that there's just no keeping a few Britpop veterans down In September’s column I reviewed Death. Not the concept itself, no, but a debut single of the same name by stately indie rockers White Lies. Eight months later they return to the Dirty Dozen with a follow-up called, er, Death (**, 22 Jun). It’s obviously a reissue, but this time they lose a star for repetition. San Franciscans LoveLikeFire have similarly grand ambitions, with their femalefronted-Killers schtick and straining guitar lines. And while bombastic new single Stand In Your Shoes (**, 15 Jun) does everything it can to fill a stadium, the end result, by contrast, is an empty space. Despite their name, Essex pop-punks Baddies are worryingly safe. Sure, they try their damnedest to be England’s latest hard-rocking heroes on new single Holler For My Holiday (**, 1 Jun). Trouble is, they come off sounding more like Green Day on a bad day. If any band is the epitome of the teenage stereotype, it is Enter Shikari. They may actually be in their 20s, but their lug-lacerating electro thrash is the sonic manifestation of hoodie-clad, hormonally-imbalanced experimentation. Juggernauts (**, 15 Jun), though, is just another uneasy mix of happy hardcore and transatlantic emo. While Enter Shikari attempt to forge something new from the clash of two genres, unsigned London trio Tape The Radio sound like an overly familiar swirl of any number of indie acts of the past ten years on their debut single. With its echoes of Interpol and Bloc Party, Save A Life (**, 15 Jun) is polished but stiflingly derivative. The Scandinavian conveyor belt of indie-pop keeps rolling this month. Hailing from Copenhagen, the excellently named No and the Maybes rekindle some of the wide-eyed pop of Blur’s pomp on Petra Petrified (***, 1 Jun), a richly melodic song that bodes well for their future.

DJANGO DJANGO

Last month I was quite ungentlemanly in my comments about three female solo artists. So I’m happy to report that I have some good things to say about La Roux. Apparently there’s a bloke behind the scenes too, but that’s beside the point. Bulletproof (***, 15 Jun) is sheen over substance, but didn’t The Human League prove that this in itself can be no bad thing? In a similar vein, Canadians Metric return from, well, no hiatus at all, with the first single from their recent fourth album. Sick Muse (***, 1 Jun) is an oddity: a glitzy pop song dripping in lyrical vitriol. It suffers from a stilted intro, but picks up nicely with Emily Haines’ pleading chorus. When he’s not installing himself in Parisian art galleries, Jarvis Cocker is still pursuing his musical career (must be about his third by now?). This limited edition 7” reissue of his Record Store Day contribution, Angela (***, 15 Jun), is a passable attempt at glam rock, though hardly an artistic masterpiece. All

my instincts warn me that a new single from Placebo should be bad. Really bad. But while For What It’s Worth (***, 1 Jun) is basically just more of the same woe-is-me whining over big meaty rock, it’s actually not as terrible as I’m making it out to be. But one indie veteran is still worth his salt. Former Delgados frontman Alun Woodward has evidently not lost his ear for a disarming pop melody with his latest incarnation, Lord Cut-Glass. Look After Your Wife (****, 15 Jun) comes in two parts: an upbeat, acoustic first half with ornate violins, followed by an edgier, accelerating coda. But enough of the oldies. June’s Single of the Month comes from a band so new I’m struggling to find out anything about them. London-based but with a suspiciously Scottish sounding singer, Django Django take Hot Chip’s musical toolkit and build compact, weird little pop songs. Storm (****, 22 Jun) is their stomping calling card.

SINGLE REVIEWS MASTODON

THE COLOURFUL BAND

MEURSAULT

OBLIVION

THE COLOURFUL EP

NOTHING BROKE EP

8 JUN, REPRISE

OUT NOW, VET

OUT NOW, SONG, BY TOAD RECORDS

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Mastodon remain a befuddling proposition; while crafting sounds that are increasingly more accessible to a non-metalhead audience, the group keep the concepts high and the track lengths epic and thus never for the charts. So it’s both logical and insane that they should release Oblivion as a single. This lead track from Crack the Skye is as digestible as the ‘don get, where their mid-tempo chugging drives into a soaring harmonic chorus. The vocals oddly recall mid-’90s Ozzy, but the pantomimic self-caricature is traded for a vague out-of-body narrative. But even when detached from Skye’s ambitious story arc, Oblivion’s a fair gambit to lure in the casual listener.[Jason Morton]

Amongst the ‘bigger’ songs on Meursault’s debut album, A Single Stretch of Land showed that songwriter and vocalist Neil Pennycook can do pared-back and restrained as well as he does full-throated and full-on electro. This gorgeous EP is further proof of their versatility – give them a laptop or give them a banjo, harmonium and some handclaps, and the end result is equally as stunning. Red Candle Bulb is a cover of the song by the sublime Withered Hand, of whose band Pennycook is also an integral part. Part 1 and 2 of William Henry Miller will appear again in a fuller form, but for now get your hands on this limited edition release any way you can. Essential listening. [Milo McLaughlin]

PLAYING ABC, GLASGOW ON 7 JUN

The Colourful Band is primarily the work of Ian McKelvie, an Edinburgh resident inspired to song by six months travelling in Australia. If the gap-year biography awakens horrid prejudices against tedious self-appointed nomads, or, worse, fears of Jack Johnson-based inspiration, then you can relax: The Colourful EP is a delight. Think music reminiscent of acoustic Go-Betweens, which, when coupled with poetically simple lyrics such as “my mouth’s just as dry as the Edinburgh sky” create an atmosphere free of pretense. The accented vocal burr and catchy melody of Easter Road recalls a stripped-back Ballboy, while The Falling Leave sounds a lot like Manc troubadour Liam Frost, but through all the similarities what resounds most clearly is the arrival of a promising songwriting talent. [Chris Buckle]

WWW.MASTODONROCKS.COM

PLAYING ELVIS SHAKESPEARE, EDINBURGH ON 20 JUN.

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/MEURSAULTA701

HOCKEY

DIVORCE

PLAYING SNEAKY PETE’S, EDINBURGH ON 20 JUN.

THE GOTHENBURG ADDRESS

LEARN TO LOSE

DIVORCE EP

A LESSER COMING HOME

1 JUN, VIRGIN

29 JUN, OPTIMO MUSIC

OUT NOW, I MESSIAH RECORDS

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Here’s a band that has been virtually tailor-made for success. Endowed with a singer who has the rockstar book of delivery down pat (shifting effortlessly between coarse yelling and funky falsetto), the kind of pristine production more commonly associated with New York dance acts, and unashamed pop inclinations, Portland-based Hockey simply can’t fail. And that’s just the problem: they sound too good. Learn To Lose is a peppy blast of indie-funk; a flurry of spidery guitar trickery, swirling synths and ooh-aah backing vocals. It’s undeniably catchy, but the sum of the parts is undeniably lacking in something. [Nick Mitchell]

These days, the ‘post-rock’ label seems to be bandied around in much the same way as ‘prog’ used to, acting as a lazy shorthand for long instrumentals with overindulgent production, and accompanied by a mish-mash of orchestral and electronic stew. There is no getting away from the fact that The Gothenburg Address do emotive, instrumental music, but their particular brand of post-rock is lean and taut, with none of the orchestral excesses of the overly morose Godseed!, or the delay-fetish of the clinically sterille Explosions in the Sky. Instead, the Address find solace in understated shoegaze guitar, knowing that flirting coyly is better than indulging in a full blown (muscial) orgy. [Ewen Millar]

PLAYING T IN THE PARK, BALADO ON 12 JUL

Glasgow label Optimo Music unleash ten inches of pure, inky-black, tightlywound noise with the release of Divorce’s self-titled debut EP. The five-piece include former members of Bricolage and the sorely missed Pro Forma. Utterly relentless for the entirety of its four-track duration, this debut is as dizzying as a cloth full of ether to the face and as barbaric as your average BDSM film. Rough edged and loud as fuck is the order of the day as this record perfectly captures the sheer ferocity of Divorce’s live act. Thunderous drums, squealing guitars and toe-curling, head-splitting screams feature throughout as they fulfil their promise of bringing their creation of blackened heart ‘nae wave’ to the masses. [Chris Duncan]

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/HOCKEY

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/PUREDIVORCED

WWW.THEGOTHENBURGADDRESS.COM

WITHERED HAND

YOU’RE NOT ALONE EP 15 JUN, SL/FENCE RECORDS

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DEERHUNTER

RAINWATER CASSETTE EXCHANGE EP 22 JUN, 4AD

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PLAYING SNEAKY PETE'S, EDINBURGH ON 21 JUN

WOODENBOX WITH A FISTFUL OF FIVERS

HANG THE NOOSE 13 JUN, KING TUT’S RECORDINGS

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After the rollicking full band sing-along of first EP Religious Songs, this second EP showcases the more reflective side of Withered Hand’s Dan Willson, here performing solo with a beautifully restrained multi-instrumental accompaniment by King Creosote, who also produced. The same endearingly fragile delivery and razor sharp one-liners remain, but this time around the emotional clout is a whole lot more forceful. Opener No Cigarettes with its Dylan-esque rolling guitar and Oldsmobile Car (aka Red Candle Bulb) with its killer line “I am what was once widely known as a sensitive soul” are accompanied by a moving tribute to the late local artist Paul Carter and a transcendental harmony-laden version of Tiger Saw’s R U Courageous. Gorgeous, and a must for modern folk fans. [Milo McLaughlin]

Okay, this is how EPs should be done. Five songs in fifteen minutes that serve to remind us just what a freakish talent Bradford Cox actually is. As his gorgeously restrained voice ekes out unforgettable melodies, Deerhunter’s similarly economical rhythm section propel the songs through numerous subtle and affecting changes. Disappearing Ink is surely one of the simplest and most devastating songs they’ve laid down, while Game of Diamonds is right up there with the best material from 2008 LP Microcastle, replete with that album’s dreamy, hallucinogenic vibe. Deerhunter are evidently a band at the height of their powers; this is great music made by people who sound like they genuinely love what they’re doing. Incredible. [Mark Shukla]

Scotland’s love affair with American country stretches much further back than Sons and Daughters’ Johnny Cash fixations, but it is at this crossroads that Woodenbox With A Fistful of Fivers can be found. Their new single on King Tut’s Recordings is a classic tale of a Southern state hanging, with rolling snare rhythms, and lonesome, reverberant whistling. The town’s collective culpability for the lynching of a young man whose guilt is ambiguous adds a dark, unexpected twist to the Morricone-esque spaghetti riffs, rich brass harmonies and Cajun compliments, snatching the track away from pastiche. Catchier than a beard in a thorn bush. [Jamie Scott]

PLAYING ELECTRIC CIRCUS, EDINBURGH ON 9 JUN

DEERHUNTERTHEBAND.BLOGSPOT.COM

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/AWOODENBOX

46 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

PLAYING SNEAKY PETE’S ON 11 JUN AND KING TUT’S ON 13 JUN

Before they unleash The Mirror Explodes – their most accomplished album to date – Mark Shukla talks to uncompromising LA outsiders The Warlocks and finds out what keeps them awake at night

Ten years is a long time. But ten years in a psychedelic rock band is a hell of a long time – no matter what drugs you’re on. One has to wonder what occult forces have been holding The Warlocks together during the past decade; a decade that’s seen the band weather innumerable line-up changes, drug dramas and industry convulsions and still emerge on the other side with five great albums under their belt. They’ve made it this far, but there’s no doubt that the industry in 2009 is as volatile as it ever has been. Taciturn frontman and creative mainstay Bobby Hecksher is candid about the prevailing cultural climate in the US: “It’s a nightmare for musicians and labels. The first thing a lot of people cut back on is in areas like music, movies and the arts. Everything that we do feels like a struggle, and with little reward sans the joy of the music itself. I see it first hand with touring circuits and people downloading music for free. It’s just another battle we have to deal with which was already a mess to begin with! It’s not all gloom and doom though... I do feel everything comes in waves and things will catapult back in the right direction soon. I love songwriting and that makes me happy even if the current mood may not seem that way.” With song titles such as There is a Formula to Your Despair and Slowly Disappearing, a casual observer may find that last comment hard to swallow, but Hecksher is clearly an advocate of the old adage “If life gives you lemons...”. The only real difference being that Hecksher’s lemons are filled with sadness, paranoia and vivid lysergic dread. Red Camera, the first single from their new album, is as adept a dissection of the pathology of fear as you could wish to hear. Fuzz, feedback and five minutes alone with your psyche are all The Warlocks need to do the job. “It’s about nightmares of being in hospital,” Hecksher explains, before adding with frightening abstruseness, “it’s something that plagues all touring musicians.” The Mirror Explodes marks a genuinely impressive progression from the slightly caricatured histrionics of their last LP, a maturation that gives the record tremendous replay value. “It’s the completion of a certain period of sound for us. It’s everything that’s been on my mind the last few years,” says Hecksher. Anyone interested in the architecture of noise or the

"We live in a very selfish world. We take, take, take until everything is destroyed" Bobby Hecksher use of production as an artistic tool rather than just as a means to make music sound loud on the radio will find many sonic worlds to explore on this album. As for what the future holds for The Warlocks, it seems that their ability to find beauty in the darkest spaces will stand them in good stead as the century progresses. Let’s face it, they’ll have no shortage of material to inspire them. Theirs is a heavy trip, and Bobby Hecksher is in no mood for sugar-coating: “What I can say is that things are messed up out there. We live in a very selfish world. We take, take, take until everything is destroyed. We breed animals and then slaughter them for our Big Macs. We squeeze every last dime and soul out of everything around us. And for what? To secure profit margins? Look up in the sky my friend, do you see smog? I do. Lots of it. I care about these things. I could go on and on but it’s not my place, it’s not my forum and I’m certainly not the best speaker in the world. Having said that, The Warlocks still get along great and still love making music together, even if the current mood may not seem that way. I go through phases, but hopefully I’ll slingshot out of it into a positive motion. One can only hope.” The Mirror Explodes is released via Teepee Records on 15 June.

Give the balky mule what he wants Life has presented Sam Jones with some very obscure experiences. David McNamara finds out why globe trotting and burnt down venues cannot slow the progress of The Balky Mule

Love can make a man do some pretty extreme things, just ask Sam Jones AKA The Balky Mule. The Bristol born singer songwriter currently resides in Melbourne, Australia after succumbing to his helpless romantic side. When asked what inspired him to travel to the other side of the world he simply states: “I just followed my girlfriend out here.” He then jokes, “with her full knowledge and consent, of course.” This short statement sums up Jones’ personality and songwriting style perfectly. His delicate nature and endearing sense of humour is elegantly captured on The Length of the Rail, an album he recorded entirely from the confines of his bedroom. When discussing what he hoped to achieve with the album, he says “It is partly influenced by 60s producers like Joe Meek or Lee Perry. I love the warmth and the bass sounds they got,” before observing, “It’s an understandable influence considering mine was a bedroom recording using a limited amount of equipment.” The skilled storytelling of Jones is not simply confined to his music. When speaking about his globe trotting adventures, he recalls a memorable performance whilst traveling in Asia: “I stopped over in Japan a couple of years ago, a friend met me from the plane and drove us through the night to play at a tiny cafe in Kyoto. I was singing all these lonely songs I’d been writing which felt odd given the language barrier I assumed there was between me and the audience. There was a novice Zen monk there from Essex called Steve who did impromptu beat boxing during the next band’s set while I played drums on the woks in the kitchen.” It doesn’t take long before our conversation drifts towards musical influences, where Jones readily admits “Dymaxion were inspirational in their chopping together of garage band sounds and Raymond Scott style electronics. “I wanted to work towards a way of singing and a subject matter that felt comfortable with me,” Jones elaborates. “Jonathan Richman and Syd Barrett are good examples of this. I really enjoy their songs.”

The multi-instrumentalist incorporates a lot of electronic samples into his music, but rather than make these the central focus of his songs, Jones simply tucks them neatly into the background to give each track a sense of enchantment. This is a concept he asserts was his intention from the very beginning: “There is a balance of electronic and acoustic sounds. The electric sounds are more towards the Raymond Scott side of things than Aphex Twin.” Jones may be currently enjoying the warm reception his album is receiving, but his career didn’t get off to the best of starts. In 2000 the young troubadour was set to play his first ever solo gig under the moniker The Balky Mule at the legendary Cube Cinema in Bristol. However, fate had other plans. In a staggering twist of bad luck, the venue burned to the ground the night before he was due to perform and his debut was cancelled. It seems that Jones’ fortunes were destined to change. Whilst living in Australia he unwittingly earned himself a recording contract thanks to his brother, lead singer of FatCat labelmates Concrete. “I had been sending my recordings back to friends in England, and was working up to collecting the best received ones into a demo to send to some labels. This process was cut short when my brother Matt sent his favourites to FatCat,” Jones recalls, before joking: “Now I guess I’ll never know what EMI would have made of it.” Having emerged victorious from a full UK tour of intimate performances in May, it would appear that the Mule is indeed getting what he wants. It’s a fair shout to say that you might discover your new favourite singer songwriter on TenTracks’ FatCat channel this month. Range by The Balky Mule is available via the latest installment of the FatCat channel on tentracks.co.uk alongside contributions by the likes of Frightened Rabbit, Ten Kens and Max Richter. www.myspace.com/thebalkymule

www.thewarlocks.com

June 2009

THE SKINNY 47

Records

Fevered Dreamers

www.tentracks.co.uk

RECORDS

ALBUM OF THE MONTH: DIRTY PROJECTORS BITTE ORCA 8 JUN, DOMINO

rrrr Bitte Orca is where it all comes good for New York’s Dirty Projectors, with the highfalutin’ concepts of Dave Longstreth’s previous albums dropped in favour of writing idea-crammed songs with almost-pop hooks. Variously reminiscent of Pere Ubu, Talking Heads, King Sunny Adé, Nico, The Fiery Furnaces, Frank Zappa, Peter Gabriel, and on and Ariston, Bitte Orca sounds like no one else at all. Hear how his vocals leap and spin over complex fingerpicking and Afropop rhythms on Temecula Sunrise; how the female vocals on Stillness Is The Move soar like an R&B diva’s, adding pop shine

and grace to all the underlying oddness. Listen to how Useful Chamber glides from Casio demo mode beats and natty rapping to a raucous garage rock freakout to a chorus of painful-then-angelic cries to bizarre crooning balladry and, whew, back to Jack White’s nightmares again. Bitte Orca is playful and romantic, and often quite bewildering, but for all the elastic singing and idiosyncratic structuring, it’s also Longstreth’s most lovable set yet. [Ally Brown] WWW.MYSPACE.COM/DIRTYPROJECTORS

ALBUM REVIEWS FUTURE OF THE LEFT

EELS

TRAVELS WITH MYSELF AND ANOTHER

EELS - HOMBRE LOBO: 12 SONGS OF DESIRE

22 JUN, 4AD

1 JUN, E WORKS

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New musical maxim: “In the land of the three-piece, tone is King”. To support this bold new truth, Future of the Left squeeze every drop of juice and pulp out of that bass guitar and not one ounce misses the microphone. The sound is just furious throughout: drums are similarly well-captured while the synths, especially on stomping album keystone You Need Satan More Than He Needs You, are gritty as hell. This display of auditory aptitude is nicely complemented by the fact that the band have lost none of their knack for hooky, original rock music. Likewise their lyrics are still often works of concise and cynical postmodern brilliance, such as on Stand By Your Manatee. There are no bad tracks on this record so, instead, allow us to draw your attention to the penultimate tune, Drink Nike, which is one of the best realisations to date of Andy Falkous’s new formula.[Chris Cusack] FUTURE OF THE LEFT PLAY POWER UP AT STUDIO 24, EDINBURGH ON 5 JUNE. SUPPORT COMES FROM DEGRASSI, 1” VOLCANO AND TEMPERCALM. WW.FUTUREOFTHELEFT.COM

GOES CUBE

GOD HELP THE GIRL

GOD HELP THE GIRL 22 JUN , ROUGH TRADE

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Mark Everett’s back catalogue as Eels is, on the whole, a heart-on-sleeve collection – from the trauma and desperation of Electro-Shock Blues, to the epic introspection of his magnum opus, Blinking Lights and Other Revelations. Although Hombre Lobo is a concept album, Everett’s troubled psyche is rarely far from the surface. The protagonist’s (Hombre Lobo means ‘werewolf’) self-appraisal oscillates from world-beater (Prize Fighter) to deadbeat (What’s A Fella Gotta Do) at the drop of a hat. Alongside E’s penchant for mood swings, he retains an ear for devastatingly simple, charming songs (My Timing Is Off). Gone are the sweeping strings of Blinking Lights; sometimes Everett sounds like he’s singing from under his bed. There are few bands that could make such a “regression” successfully, but the lo-fi production amplifies the childlike marvel in Eels’ songs. And while it may not scale the lofty heights of its predecessor, Hombre Lobo is an endearing addition to the archive. [Finbarr Bermingham]

God Help The Girl is a new project from Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch, a proposed musical film whose soundtrack features guest vocals from Neil Hannon, Asya from American teen duo Smoosh, and a clutch of debutante female vocalists including ex-Belle & Seb artwork model Catherine Ireton. The title character is an intelligent, imaginative and idealistic young girl who nevertheless buys the Independent to look smart, and who regularly has to fend off interested boys because they don’t meet her impossible standards. In fact, she’s almost a stock character for Murdoch by now, and her personality is painted vividly here. But without the film to help connect all the dots, God Help The Girl as a stand-alone album is hard to get excited about, revealing so little of its story arc, and suffering as it does from a few sterile arrangements. Unfortunately, it’s for Belle and Sebastian anoraks only. [Ally Brown]

WWW.EELSTHEBAND.COM

WWW.GODHELPTHEGIRL.COM

IRON CREASE

LORD CUT-GLASS

ANOTHER DAY HAS PASSED

EYE INCREASE

LORD CUT-GLASS

29 JUN, THE END RECORDS

15 JUN, METAL LICKER

22 JUN, CHEMIKAL UNDERGROUND

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This thunderous three-piece from NYC are keen to play up their lack of concern for image, industry parties and becoming players on the Big Apple scene. True enough, their take on metal is completely unfashionable, but in many ways admirably so. Goes Cube lack much of the art-tinged crossover appeal that the likes of Mastodon and Isis have courted to good effect, despite sharing moments of downtuned brutality and harmonised righteousness that come close to both of the aforementioned ATP favourites. Another Day Has Passed showcases riff-heavy fury aimed at genuine metal fans, not hedging its bets in pursuit of knowing nods of ironic approval from fashionistas or alternative band-makers like Mike Patton. That sense of single-minded commitment to the cause alone gains them a patronising slap on the back. There are numerous ideas on show though, so how long Goes Cube can avoid picking up a hipster fanbase is debatable. [Chris Cusack]

Thanks to an extended period of collective inactivity, the scattered members of cult Dundonians Laeto are gradually re-emerging into the world with new bands and projects. Iron Crease sees drummer Robbie Cooper (also of extreme noise terrorists Geisha) teaming up with Stephen Kerrison, former guitarist with Bristol’s defunct eccentrics Safetyword. Thanks to some multiple ampage and an octaver pedal, this duo produce quite a racket. There are obvious similarities to Oxes, especially due to a lack of vocals, but the music sports a clear love of acts as disparate as Megadeth and June of 44. Steam Iron Age features a central riff that would sit proudly on any Fu Manchu record, whereas I, Ron Crease is a shuffling, sporadic exercise in tension and release. Considering their limited options, the two protagonists do a damn fine job of keeping the music interesting and varied for 25 jamming, gutsy minutes. [Austin Tasseltine]

No one could accuse Alun Woodward of rushing things. Lord Cut-Glass is the alias under which the former Delgado has slowly been unveiling his solo material since 2007, averaging about a track a year. Now, however, he releases his full-length solo debut, and it seems to have been worth the wait. There’s a certain wistful irony in Woodward’s ostentatious new alias and album cover, as if there is a tacit acknowledgement, replete with half-smile, of the gulf between the baroque grandeur of the musical arrangements and the guid auld-fashioned blunt honesty of the lyrics, delivered in their author’s unmistakably Scottish accent. Yet Woodward has hit upon a successful formula, managing to create a record which combines traditional Scots parochialism with our tendency to think bigger than our limits, and a rhythmic dynamism that lends proceedings their own indefinable energy. On the whole, this record is an almost perfectly executed quirky pop gem. [Gillian Watson]

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/GOESCUBE

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/IRONCREASE

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/LORDCUTGLASS

MEAT PUPPETS

SONIC YOUTH

SPARE SNARE

SEWN TOGETHER

THE ETERNAL

I LOVE YOU, I HATE YOU

8 JUN, MEGAFORCE RECORDS

8 JUN , MATADOR

1 JUN, CHUTE RECORDS

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Despite Curt Kirkwood’s assertions that “if I can get away with it, I’ll make a record as cheap as I can and put as little work as I can into it,” you really wouldn’t know on listening to Sewn Together. The recording is lush and cheerful while the takes are vibrant and relatively flawless. Certainly much of the ragged, naïve charm of their first three albums has long since vanished amidst as many decades of increasingly self-assured indie rock. With Cris Kirkwood’s one-man soap opera now apparently having run its course and drummer Ted Marcus long since integrated as a full member, the new material sounds as cohesive as earlier work and will sit comfortably alongside – or indeed above – most of that back-catalogue. Rotten Shame is probably the closest this album gets to the old days and, though the nostalgia feels nice, it’s far from the best song on show. [Chris Cusack]

Sonic Youth’s greatest album is always whichever one you heard first unless that was NYC Ghosts & Flowers (you poor thing). The band’s famous experimentalism, so initially radical to the sonic tuning of a youthful mind, starts to sound kinda formulaic after your fifth or sixth album of it. But so what if they’ve been scratching the same off-chords for 20 years, if Thurston Moore is still sloganeering cryptic bullshit in his same slacker-kid drawl now he’s hit 50 years old? Somehow – maybe it’s a good skin care regime – The Eternal keeps up their new millennium hot streak, which is still slightly behind their 80s hot streak, but catching. Somewhere, today, a 15-year-old’s musical world is being turned upside down by The Eternal; for the rest of us, it sounds a lot like a Sonic Youth album. This is no bad thing. [Ally Brown]

“I don’t care what you thinks.” Hissing electronics snatched from early Grandaddy records and distorted with the scuzz of the Probe Plus back catalogue: this only barely close to describing how lo-fi this home recording by Spare Snare is. Eight albums in, and the Dundee indie heroes persist with charmingly clumsy recordings, as the cardboard drums and paper guitars that helped make their name are intact. The highlight, for all its hiss, squall and squeak, is Qwerty For The Masses, a surefire anthem for part-time musicians everywhere. Of all Scotland’s numerous best kept secrets, Spare Snare remain one of the most well hidden, not helped by the pointed amateurism and sparsity of their recordings. Yet as the tunes begin to shine through on repeated listens, the production values only serve to make I Love You, I Hate You all the more glorious. [Jamie Scott]

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/THEMEATPUPPETS

WWW.SONICYOUTH.COM

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/SPARESNARE

48 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

TV21

THE WARLOCKS

WE WERE PROMISED JETPACKS

FOREVER 22

THE MIRROR EXPLODES

OUT NOW, POWBEAT RECORDS

15 JUN, TEEPEE

THESE FOUR WALLS

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15 JUN, FATCAT

Never mind Axl Rose and his overblown, over-produced codswallop of a comeback last year. With Forever 22, new wave also-rans TV21 deliver their second album after a staggering 28-year hiatus. And with no pressure or expectations, the Edinburgh quartet have delivered a fine longplayer of unrelenting upbeat pop still in thrall to their brand of ‘80s ‘indie’ that existed before the term became embarrassing and meaningless. This amounts to some Smithsian frippery early on, delivered with plenty of homespun Scottish charm. Then, pulling us out of our cosy little time capsule, there’s a spot of (eek) electro-lite Celtic folk on In Another World that amazingly manages to sound pretty good. There are a few missteps along the way, particularly the daytime quiz show-esque Through Different Eyes, but after almost three decades in storage for TV21, we can put this down to a bit of initial stiffness. A quick stretch, and who knows what’s next? [Darren Carle]

Having dabbled successfully with the poppier end of psych-rock on previous albums, The Mirror Explodes finds the Warlocks sounding more sombre and more focused than ever before. Ostensibly their least accessible LP, it is also their most fully realised work: an immersive journey into the heart of noise that pulls no punches and packs a weighty emotional punch. Dynamically it’s a revelation, the band having pieced together a tapestry of shimmering drone, wailing feedback and ecstatic fuzz that can stand shoulder to shoulder with anything that MBV, Cocteau Twins or the JaMC ever recorded. That’s not hyperbole - it really does sound that good. It’s a draining listen but I’ll be damned if blasting Standing Between the Lovers of Hell - the throbbing vortex at the heart of this album - isn’t the single most exhilarating listening experience I’ve had this year. [Mark Shukla]

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/TV21OFFICIAL

WWW.THEWARLOCKS.COM

WHITE DENIM

rrr We Were Promised Jetpacks couldn’t have timed it better. In the post-breakthrough hiatus of Frightened Rabbit and The Twilight Sad, indie aficionados have been gantin’ for another tartan-clad troupe upon which to pin their adulation. This may well be that band. The Edinburgh quartet’s debut LP These Four Walls is a plastercast hybrid of their FatCat stablemates’ rugged soundscapes and self-effacing reportage. Yet, as compelling as Quiet Little Voices and Short Bursts are, a gnarling sense of over-appropriation permeates the record’s spine. Densely-produced guitar slasher Roll Up Your Sleeves unravels as unshapely shrill, while Conductor’s primitive vignettes disembowel the luscious melodic undertone of chime and strum. When they’re on the pulse it’s exhilarating – Keeping Warm’s cacophonous eight-minute flurry is a breathtaking sonic throb - but too much is weighed down by hurried expectancy. Perhaps the promise of jetpacks has arrived just a little too soon [Billy Hamilton] PLAYING CABARET VOLTAIRE, EDINBURGH ON 9 JUNE; DOGHOUSE, DUNDEE ON 10 JUNE; KING TUT’S, GLASGOW ON 15 JUNE; WWW.MYSPACE.COM/WEWEREPROMISEDJETPACKS

YOU ALREADY KNOW

JACK PEÑATE

FITS

STOP WHISPERING

EVERYTHING IS NEW

22 JUN, FULL TIME HOBBY

15 JUN, OFF THE BEATEN TRACK

22 JUN, XL RECORDINGS

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Given the editorial constraints of the average Skinny review it’d be hard even to simply list the genres and bands whose influences shine through on the excellent modern rock cacophony that is White Denim without running horribly over the word-count. This, technically their third album, sports more of the frantic, exploratory brilliance that saw them evade every pigeon-hole imaginable since setting stereos on fire in 2008. Some of the more apparent comparisons can be seen in the Hendrix-aping Say What You Want and the Cream-era Clapton licks on Radio Milk How Can You Stand It. The one unifying theme in White Denim is Rock n’ Roll. As cliched and passe as that may sound, it makes for compelling listening. White Denim are both massively retro and stubbornly inventive. Their sense of adventure is confidently blended with the unpredictable, making it hard - if not impossible - to dismiss Fits as another lost homage to 60s pioneers. [Austin Tasseltine]

Since home studios revolutionised the recording industry, more and more bands have been taking matters into their own hands when it comes to capturing and releasing music. You Already Know are another fine example of just such self-sufficiency, having built their own studio above one of Glasgow’s city-centre record shops. Thankfully production values are reasonably high on Stop Whispering, their debut full-length. Their take on instrumental post-rock is a lot more direct than the swirling atmospherics of Mono, Explosions... and the Constellation bands; drums and guitar plough through riffs for much of the album, making it less a meditative experience than a soundtrack to fast driving at dusk. When the band do venture into other territories they do so with considerable success: second track Sick of Ants demonstrates a fondness for Battles’ experimental alt-rock and is arguably the best number on a solid, impressive calling card. [Austin Tasseltine]

When Jack Peñate spasmodically side-stepped on to the scene like an epileptic crab in 2006, detractors quickly lumped him in with the jangly Mockneys dominating indie clubs at the time, joining acts like pals The Maccabees and Kate Nash. Despite the irritatingly frenetic pace of his debut album, many listeners were moved to admit that somewhere beneath the non-stop knees-up lay the work of a genuinely gifted songwriter. And with Everything is New, he’s let that songwriter out of the armlock and off the dancefloor, where he’s crafted a considered yet catchy collection of blue-eyed future soul. That affected London whine has been abandoned somewhere in a Hoxton basement and replaced with a more natural, Robert Smith-like croon. Producer Paul “Phones” Epworth has created a warm, expansive environment to win over the coldest of critics, and highlights like the title track or Tonight’s Today represent a mature and eminently likeable new Jack Peñate. [Euan Ferguson]

PLAYING MADHATTERS, INVERNESS ON 4 JUNE; BALCONY BAR, DUNDEE ON 5 JUNE; STEREO, GLASGOW ON 18 JUNE

PLAYING THE BONGO CLUB, EDINBURGH ON 16 JUNE.

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/WHITEDENIMMUSIC

MAGNETIC MORNING

WWW.JACKPENATE.COM

DINOSAUR JR.

SUNSET RUBDOWN

A.M.

FARM

DRAGONSLAYER

29 JUN, FRIEND OR FAUX

22 JUN, JAGJAGUWAR

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The result of a creative mind-meld between Adam Franklin (Swervedriver) and Sam Fogarino (Interpol), Magnetic Morning’s debut arrives with a whisper which belies the weight of its makers. Aptly titled opener Spring Unseen lays down a blueprint where evocative loops are complemented by an echoed refrain; Fogarino’s slow burning keyboard melodies are masterfully shot through the melancholic gauze of Franklin’s chilling baritone and, occasionally, that reverb-heavy guitar. A.M. rarely disappoints, though the gospel-influenced cover of The Shangri-Las’ Out in the Streets is a lethargic trundle, even in the soporific context of its psych-drone siblings. Lyrically, Franklin laments space debris found in an Athens river and draws vivid pictures of listless drives, literally revisiting the highways that defined his time with the Swervies. But this is no misguided retread; tracks like The Wrong Turn prove that – when it takes their fleeting fancy – Magnetic Morning can confidently square up to Mark Hollis at his most divine. [Dave Kerr]

Two albums into their nothing-short-of-miraculous reunion, and protogrunge pioneers Dinosaur Jr are, put simply, on a roll. The newfound restraint displayed on their latest LP is powerful: where earlier albums were Tyrannosaurus Rexes thundering across the landscape destroying everything in their wake, Farm is more of a graceful Diplodocus striding through the plains. The elements which make the trio’s sound distinct are here - J Mascis’s effortless guitar pyrotechnics, Lou and Murph’s rock-solid rhythm section - but there’s less noise shrouding Mascis’s wearily beautiful melodies. It’s as if the band have finally relaxed, and this relaxation, rather than leading to creative stasis, has produced a record whose clarity sounds triumphant and groundbreaking. Where reunion records tend towards disappointing cash-ins or, at worst, acts of necrophilia, Mascis and Co. buck the trend, as they’ve always done, and prove that they’re not extinct quite yet. [Gillian Watson]

Sunset Rubdown’s latest LP is pertinently inscribed. The indie-rock psalms of Spencer Krug have long rested on a mythological mantel, but the Montreal ensemble’s third full-length, Dragonslayer, scythes through his muddied vignettes with taut instrumental throttles, conjuring up the consistency that has eluded the group’s previous endeavours. Opening number Silver Moon is indicative of this newfound gusto; bulging bass underpins the frontman’s woozy vocals, while a cavalcade of percussion crashes headlong into nomadic organ chimes. Noticeably, Krug’s succumbed to an accessibility that infuses Idiot Heart and You Go On Ahead with a sway so vigorous it borders on choleric. Lyrically, however, he’s as opaque as ever, blurting out metaphors with unapologetic vim. Yet, so densely orchestrated are tracks like Dragon’s Lair and Paper Lace that the spotlight veers instinctively towards their delicious underlying melodies. It’s not quite prime beef Wolf Parade, but Dragonslayer confirms Spencer Krug’s still got that killer touch.[Billy Hamilton]

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/MAGNETICMORNING

WWW.DINOSAURJR.COM

PLAYING STEREO, GLASGOW ON 10 SEPTEMBER.

CASS MCCOMBS

CATACOMBS 1 JUN, DOMINO

rrr US singer-songwriter Cass McCombs returns with his second album for Domino, Catacombs, a musically melancholic but lyrically sharp record. McCombs is a drifter, travelling from coast to coast; his music replicates the wandering nature of his existence with hesitant but peripatetic drums rendering the gentler of his songs with ramshackle intensity, while at each track’s heart lies an unnamed melancholy which cumulatively makes Catacombs an affecting listen. It’s difficult to hang McCombs with the lazy Americana label - while the pedal steel on You Saved My Life has a Nashville tinge to it, so too does the bassline recall ‘80s Australian post-punk; when he gives in and produces songs which hint heavily at roots in American tradition, such as the weary, directionless Jonesy Boy, the album comes closer to falling flat. McCombs’ determined wriggling away from stereotypes which would confine his artistic vision, as well as his uniquely wry and observational lyrics, set him apart. Pigeonhole at your peril. [Gillian Watson]

TOP FIVE ALBUMS

1. DIRTY PROJECTORS - BITTE ORCA 2. FUTURE OF THE LEFT -

TRAVELS WITH MYSELF...

3. LORD CUT-GLASS LORD CUT-GLASS 4. SUNSET RUBDOWN DRAGONSLAYER

5. DINOSAUR JR - FARM

REVIEWS ONLINE SSs sss ss sss ss ss ss ssss sss ssss ssss ss ss ss

ADAM FRANKLIN - SPENT BULLETS ASTRID WILLIAMSON - HERE COME THE VIKINGS BROKEN RECORDS - UNTIL THE EARTH... FRANZ FERDINAND - BLOOD FREELAND - COPE™ GEORGIA'S HORSE - THE MAMMOTH SESSIONS JAMES BLACKSHAW - THE GLASS BEAD GAME JOHN PAUL KEITH & THE ONE FOUR FIVES - SPILLS AND THRILLS LAROCA - VALLEY OF THE BEARS MEAT PUPPETS - SEWN TOGETHER PATRICK WOLF - THE BACHELOR PAOLO NUTINI - SUNNY SIDE UP STEEL PANTHER - FEEL THE STEEL TV21 - FOREVER 22

WWW.MYSPACE.COM/CASSMCCOMBS

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 49

RECORDS

ALBUM REVIEWS

Manic Street Preachers

with any such apathy. Embracing their post-punk roots, Bradfield’s distinct Magazine-like riff work reigns over adrenalised centrepieces All is Vanity and Marlon J.D. before drunken, out of tune singers oblige a plea from a subdued Nicky Wire (enduring a gammy back) as he signs off Journal... with William’s Last Words. A second set comprised of hits (If You’ll Tolerate This), rarities (Sorrow 16) and a bizarre medley (Stop in the Name of Love spliced with Motown Junk, anyone?) completely ignores Lifeblood and Know Your Enemy but ensures the Welsh veterans keep the Barras in their grip. Prolapsed discs aside, if there’s one thing the Manics bring to the table tonight it’s a brand of piss and vinegar we’d foolishly feared long lost. [Dave Kerr]

Barrowlands, 25 May

rrrr Another driech night in Glasgow fails to dampen the spirits outside the Barrowlands as the hordes bay for the live premiere of Journal for Plague Lovers. Playing a brand new record in its entirety might seem like a risky strategy, but it’s a sure win scenario when you’re dealing with the frankly frightening devotion of the Manic Street Preachers fanbase. Songs that have only been available legally for a week are greeted like old friends and Richey’s name is roared all night, the long absent lyricist’s recently exhumed words bouncing off the walls like machine gun fire. “The more I see, the less I scream,” starts James Dean Bradfield on Peeled Apples, but the reality is that the Welsh trio are refusing to recline into middle age

Heidi kuisma

Manic Street Preachers play T in the Park, Balado on 11 July. www.manicstreetpreachers.com

Art Brut Stereo, 2 May

rrr If H&M made indie bands, they’d be like Boycotts (**). There isn’t a hair or note out of place, and while their new-wave-rock is competent, it’s also hopelessly sterile. Plus, if you drank every time the singer artfully ran a hand through her fringe, you’d be steaming by the end of the first number. Luckily, The Robocop Kraus (****) pack several bands’ worth of invention into their set. Imagine a German Mystery Jets with a penchant for Devo and a Stop Making Sense-era David Byrne on vocals; yes, they’re that good. But Art Brut(****) aren’t out of the game just yet. As a considerably worse-for-wear Eddie Argos powers onstage for a vigorous rendition of Alcoholics Unanimous, it’s clear this is a band who haven’t lost it. They deliver a set that’s noisy, shambolic and hugely exhilarating as it threatens to topple towards chaos at any second (witness the band’s roadie holding Argos’s mic like a leash as he wanders around the audience). Art Brut’s music isn’t beautiful or innovative, but their worldview is inspiring, and while they’re never going to be zeitgeisty again, their “slap dash for no cash” ethic should have ripples on the musical pond in decades to come. If it doesn’t, Eddie Argos will fight you.[Gillian Watson] www.myspace.com/artbrut

The Specials

Pit Er Pat Limbo, The Voodoo Rooms, 14 May

rrr In the somewhat sumptuous setting of the Voodoo Rooms, Pit Er Pat just about reach their comfort zone. Their feet seem to drag as they take the stage, but that initial reticence is lost as the audience swells before them and their limbs loosen, cobwebs shaken from their clothes. Playing tonight as a duo, Fay Davis-Jeffers and Butchy Fuego mingle spindly guitars with worldly M.I.A throbs and beat down rhythms, and as you rub your eyes, they could be a serrated plaster cast of two other American duos, Magik Markers and label mates High Places. For the most part, they ignore their most recent long player, High Time, interspersing brand new material with fruity jams, and while this boldness is an audacious setting of their stall, any opportunity to truly engage with the music remains frustratingly out of reach. As they grin to each other wryly, it seems like that was their very intention.[Jamie Scott] Jenny Anderson

Music

Live reviews

This month’s Limbo will include performances by Punch and the Apostles (4 Jun) and Joe Gideon and the Shark (25 Jun). www.myspace.com/piterpat

O2 Academy, 28 Apr

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Holy Fuck

The Specials’ almost-complete reunion shows (Jerry Dammers remains absent) are long sold-out, and tonight feels even busier due to the middle-age girth padding out many a squat fan. After a protracted ska-raoke session whips the rude boys into a full-throated frenzy, the band emerge, and from Do the Dog onwards they’re flawless. Lean and energetic, they exude the vitality of a band fresh out the blocks, without a trace of the in-itfor-the-money cynicism that too often taints reunion shows. It’s remarkable that a band who only existed for three years and two albums can play a twenty-plus song set without a shred of filler, with Little Bitch and Gangsters in particular helping to ensure the skanking doesn’t let up. They may not be the complete original line-up and they certainly aren’t as young as they used to be. But they are The Specials. And that’s more than enough. [Chris Buckle]

Òran Mór, 11 May

rrrr With a drummer and a bassist, Holy Fuck are half an indie-rock band - but the other two members create such a spectral swirling racket with knobs, buttons and a vintage 35mm film synchronizer (as bloody usual) that it’s impossible to reduce them to anything so straightforward. From the back of Òran Mór’s hall, it’s not hard to pick faults -- when you want them to go all-out Ulrich Schnauss and Can crossover, they lapse into a louche funk breakdown that loses the momentum -- but from near the stage, the gig experience is transformed. Lesson learned: proximity to the stage at a Holy Fuck gig is crucially important. At the front it’s impossible not to become immersed in the maelstrom, transfixed by the lights and strange instruments, exhilarated by the visceral thrill of the coruscating textures of noise. Hence the liturgical profanities emanating from all around.[Ally Brown]

The Specials play T in the Park, Balado on 11 July. www.thespecials.com

50 THE SKINNY June 2009

www.myspace.com/holyfuck

Crystal Antlers Sneaky Pete’s, 18 May

rrrr The unifying theme of this gig was always going to be volume – as in, lots of it. But Edinburgh band Dupec (****) refuse to be blown off the stage by their raucous American successors tonight. The trio pour their all into this their most high profile show to date, crashing every cymbal and straining every sinew of songs that are by turns intricately melodic and searingly intense. After a rather random visual interlude by an American ‘video jockey’, Ohio punks Times New Viking (***) stumble into vision with their shambolic racket, taking some time to hit their stride; their short, sharp opening songs melting into an unwieldy gloop that leaves the audience uncertain where to clap. But this simple guitar-drums-keys

trio finally shift into a wilfully discordant gear, and the reticent onlookers gradually become slightly more animate. No chance of indifference in the face of Crystal Antlers (****). Led by grizzly frontman Jonny Bell, the Californian sextet inject a not unwelcome shot of trippy psychedelica into proceedings. Bolstered by incessant organ and latin percussion, it’s an overwhelming spectacle, but they rein it all in with robust blues riffs on Andrew and A Thousand Eyes. There’s a lasting buzz in our ears, but this was well worth the damage.[Nick Mitchell] Dupec support We Were Promised Jetpacks at Cabaret Voltaire, Edinburgh on 9 June. www.myspace.com/crystalantlers

T IN THE PARK! COuRTESy Of TENNENT’S bE CHIllEd

The Tennent’s Lager Be Chilled service will seriously simplify your journey to T in the Park, held this year from the 10 - 12th July, by allowing you to place advance online orders and collect chilled cans of Tennent’s, in the campsite, over the course of the weekend. Get online now and place your orders at www.tennents.com/bechilled. The Skinny have teamed up with Tennents Be Chilled to give away two pairs of weekend with camping tickets to this year’s T in the Park and Be Chilled vouchers to collect a 4-pack of Tennent’s Lager on each day of the festival. To enter, simply tell us

What is the name of the chilled cans collection service offered by Tennent’s Lager in the legendary T in the Park campsite? To enter text TITP and your answer to 64343 or visit www.theskinny.co.uk/competitions before June 28. For the facts www.drinkaware.co.uk. Entrants must be over 18 years old. Texts cost £1 plus your standard network charge. This competition is only open to residents of the UK. Regular Skinny T&Cs apply, available on request.

June 2009

THE SKINNY 51

Music

WIN TICKETS TO

MUSIC

Live Music

PREVIEWS

Highlights by Ted Maul

GONORTH 2009 INVERNESS (VARIOUS), 11-12 JUN

And so it seems the festival season has crept back upon us, sidling up with all the stealth and dexterity of a hungry cat, almost eerily unnoticed. First there was Hinterland, then Stag and Dagger, but now the focus quite literally goes north with, um, goNorth. Now in its ninth year, the festival has become a valuable fixture on the Scottish music calendar. As well as a quite wonderful line-up of homegrown talent – the gorgeously spare Trapped in Kansas and the decidedly more sprightly angular art-pop of Nacional, to name but two – goNorth also offers a range of seminars and workshops in

almost every conceivable area of the creative arts, from publishing to fashion and textiles, and just about everything in between. As if this wasn’t already enough, it’s probably worth going for the enigmatic and intriguing “Magical Mystery Tour” (even if only to find out what this actually entails), as well as a Skinny sponsored stage featuring Naked Strangers (the band, not an assortment of flashers), Vcheka, St Deluxe and Hey Enemy. Oh, and did we mention that the entire thing is free? [Michael Hunter] FREE, WWW.GONORTH.BIZ

JARVIS COCKER

THE THERMALS

ABC, 12 JUN

SNEAKY PETE’S, 16 JUN

Out of the ashes of Pulp, the ‘90s ambassadors of Sheffield Sex City for whom the Britpop label felt more like a noose, rises the awkward phoenix of Jarvis Cocker’s solo career. Already with one solo album under his belt, this elder statesman of modern British pop appears to have taken something of an artistic left turn with Further Complications, an Albini-produced sophomore effort. But while the jury’s out on Jarvis’s rockier new direction, he is still an undeniably engaging performer, capable of making the dullest of material sparkle in the live setting. One night at the ABC should make up our minds.[Gillian Watson]

Kill Rock Stars’ Death Cab-bothering gems The Thermals bring their brand of “no-fi” indie to Auld Reekie in support of fourth full-length Now We Can See. Their first album in three years, following 2006’s lauded The Blood, The Body, The Machine, sees the band - now a trio with the arrival of their newest drummer - team up with The Paper Chase frontman John Congleton, producer of the likes of Explosions in the Sky and the Appleseed Cast, who was featured in this here magazine last month. With connections ripe for the name-dropping, and a reputation for raw, energetic performances brimming over with rabble-rousing harmonies, The Thermals are certainly worth a peek.[Lauren Mayberry]

7PM, £17.50 WWW.JARVISCOCKER.NET

DE LA SOUL PICTURE HOUSE, 5 JUN

Pioneering hip-hop trio De La Soul return to our shores, and woe betide anyone still foolish enough to call them hippies. In the two decades since their dayglo debut 3 Feet High and Rising changed the way rappers and producers approached the then-nascent art form, the band have changed styles almost as often as they change their shoes - now likely to be box-fresh Nikes, as the sportswear giants step up to sponsor eighth LP Are You In?. Questionable corporate involvements aside, De La have an impressive back catalogue (and a formidable DJ in Vincent Mason) at their disposal. Here’s hoping their new material doesn’t put us on the wrong foot come early June.[Gillian Watson] 7PM, £16. DE LA SOUL ALSO PLAY ARCHES, GLASGOW ON 6 JUN. WWW.MYSPACE.COM/DELASOUL

ACOUSTIC LADYLAND THE VOODOO ROOMS, 24 JUN

Acoustic Ladyland are the antithesis of the anodyne listening experience provided by the common-or-garden ‘mellow sax trio’. Instead, London’s finest purveyors of jazz-punk spew out a joyous racket of distorted keyboards and blistering tenor saxophone that evokes the spirit of Albert Ayler and The Stooges in equal measure. Fans of out-there sounds are guaranteed to be entertained; proof lies in the fact that drummer Seb Roachford – he of the gargantuan afro - is also the leader of Polar Bear, while the group form part of the prestigious F-IRE Collective. If you’re torn between dancing the Charleston and having a good old mosh, then these may be the cats for you.[Joe Barton] 7.30PM, £9. ALSO PLAYING KING TUT’S, GLASGOW ON 23 JUNE AND THE TUNNELS, ABERDEEN, ON 25 JUNE.

Formed from the remnants of the briefly awesome Cap ‘n Jazz, Joan of Arc welcome in the month of June with a curveball comprised of experimental indie chops, expansive post-rockisms and stream-ofconsciousness lyrics. Love them or hate them, it ain’t gonna be boring. All your irony are belong to us (them). Aberdeen Tunnels 3 June. Seems like lots of Aussie bands get slept on for some reason, but you’d have to take a lethal dose of sleeping pills to block out the noise that The Drones are making at the moment. Bombastic, caustic, yet somehow elegant at the same time, they make one hell of a compelling noise - probably one of the best live acts on tour right now. Catch them at Captain’s Rest 14 June. If chugging pop-punk is your bag then no-one right now is doing it as well as The Thermals. Catchy, nofrills guitar music - it’s harder than it looks, as anyone who caught the risible recent effort from ‘supergroup’ Tinted Windows will testify. Go forth and bounce at Sneaky Pete’s Edinburgh 16 June, and Stereo Glasgow 17 June. The one reassuring thing about being in an electropop band must be knowing that whatever happens, you can never be worse than Fischerspooner. It seems unfortunate that Findo Gask even have to be filed under the same genre, for not only can these Glasgow boys actually play their instruments, but they also write propulsive, dreamy songs that fizz with energy and real imagination. They play with similarly talented Weegies Le Reno Amps at new Edinburgh venue Electric Circus on 16 June. Regular readers already know we love their new record, so you won’t be suprised to hear how pleased we were to hear that dazzling purveyors of Balkan folk A Hawk and a Hacksaw are on tour this month. For anyone tired of the standard guitar/bass/drums combo, here is your salvation: a band that makes great dance music using some very unusual instruments. Recommended. Stirling Tolbooth 20 June, Glasgow Arches 21 June.

YOU'D HAVE TO TAKE A LETHAL DOSE OF SLEEPING PILLS TO BLOCK OUT THE NOISE THAT THE DRONES ARE MAKING AT THE MOMENT Denizens of Dundee, I do decree, My Latest Novel will pleaseth thee. Play folk do they, and rock as well; sometimes they’re quiet, sometimes they yell. If a soulful band you yearn to see, My Latest Novel will pleaseth thee! Doghouse, 23 June. The Skinny is digging on Glasgow’s St Deluxe right now. Fuzzed-out indie-rock peppered with dreamy pop hooks is how I’d describe their sound, if I was writing some some sort of brief, to-the-point music roundup. Which I am, obviously. Enough words, just enjoy the noise. Edinburgh Electric Circus 30 June. Silversun Pickups scrape into this month’s roundup by dint of their playing Glasgow Stereo on 1 July. Having copped some moves from another classic band with the initials SP, they’ve come up with a sleek, dynamic sound of their own that combines androgenous, emotive vocals with a big big guitar sound. Their new record is pretty decent too, so this is worth a shake.

8PM, £8.50. ALSO PLAYING STEREO, GLASGOW ON 17 JUNE. WWW.MYSPACE.COM/THETHERMALS

TEITUR KING TUT’S WAH WAH HUT, 7 JUN

Ultra-melancholy, ludicrously talented, doe-eyed singersongwriter, blah blah blah… It’s easy to dismiss Faroe Islands native Teitur Lassen as the latest in the line of over-hyped mopey songsmiths, but even a cursory listen to current album The Singer reveals him to be something just that little bit special. Instead of reaching for the acoustic guitar, he uses impossibly sparse string and brass arrangements to underscore his bruised, barely awake vocals, creating a brand of melancholia which, while expertly crafted, sounds strangely effortless. And it’s not all downbeat: you can shimmy along with Catherine The Waitress to your heart’s content. Granted, the subject matter rarely strays from woman trouble, but anyone who can conjure such a fresh take on the singer-songwriter schtick is certainly worth investigation. Anyone in search of a genuinely inspiring performance should grab tickets soon though as that sound you can hear is bandwagon jumpers reaching for their wallets.[Heather Crumley] 8.30PM, £8. ALSO PLAYING CABARET VOLTAIRE, EDINBURGH ON 1 JUNE AND THE LEMON TREE, ABERDEEN ON 8 JUNE. WWW.TEITUR.COM

FIND OUT WHAT'S ON, AND DO IT IN STYLE

THESKINNY.CO.UK

WWW.ACOUSTICLADYLAND.COM DRONES, CAPTAIN'S REST, 14 JUN

52 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

Music

Metal

up your

ASS by Austin Tasseltine

mastodon, abc, 7 jun

countryside, spreading their palm-muted guitar-muck with unholy relish. Their first port of call is The Captain’s Rest in Glasgow (2 Jun). Pay particular As seasons go, summer really isn’t the most conducive attention to genius, tongue-in-cheek track-titles like to sullen misery and angry, clenched-fist misanthropy. With Our Bare Asses To Hell. That is if they are indeed It must be hard to stay mad at one’s parents while the discernible. Can’t quite figure out who started that majority of the population slip into cricket whites and thrash tradition of announcing songs in the throaty unfurl chequered picnic blankets onto the ground in growl akin to a dinosaur burping. hazy public parks, rich with the laughter of children But a few days later, Amok and Kritikill Mass have and the slurping of ice cream. Equally, clinging to the a right old bloody shout at the 13th Note (5 Jun). No those feelings of high school alienation must be no offence intended, but the latter’s assertion that there small feat when confronted with long, sunny days of are “no poster boys for metal here” does sound like a park football, jumpers for goalposts and shirtless pueuphemism for “sorry, we’re a gang of munters”. But bescent boys colliding in a sweaty frenzy of goalmouth then again, aren’t most of the great metal bands? enthusiasm. The Note also plays host to Kilmarnock’s Ocean Ahem. Fracture (7 Jun) and their melodic, doomy thunder Thank the Dark Lord, then, that there are numerous but, in a truly unfortunate conflict of schedules, they fine purveyors of thrashing, head-swirling, blackwill find themselves competing with the practically clad, antisocial rock action heading this way in the untouchable Mastodon at the ABC that same night otherwise family-orientated month of June. (7 Jun). Going for the same crowd in the same city on In an unlikely international Scots-Hungarian evening as those guys is sort of like trying Cathouse 256x155blend, Skinny Section PRINT.pdfthe same 26/5/09 16:42:05 thrash monsters Black Sister set off around the to pull in the same bar as Zac Efron, George Clooney

and Steve Buscemi (you know you would, ladies). We wish them luck. For those of us still mourning the decline of the industrial scene and all the post-apocalyptic fashion possibilities it promised, 90s favourites Prong can be found at the Cathouse (11 Jun). It’s a safe bet they still play Controller. Likewise, if you persist in pairing leopard-print tights with leather jackets, you can relive those Misfit fixations when thoroughly reliable Glaswegian promoters Wreckin’ Pit bring the American goth-punk of Blitzkid to the 13th Note (12 Jun). Metal supergroup Down make a rare appearance at Glasgow’s QMU (12 Jun) allowing the faithful to catch up on the musings of Phil Anselmo. Fortunately, the band are really pretty good so there’s every chance it might be entirely possible to overlook his presence altogether. In a month of slim pickings (or at least poorly publicised pickings), Aberdeen sees All Forgotten and Mind Set A Threat rip it up at Cafe Drummond’s (18 Jun).

Back in Glasgow, Irvine-based post-metallic skull-crushers What The Blood Revealed do a little pro-tinnitus reach-out work at the prolific 13th Note with the mighty Gothenburg Address, Tempercalm and The Colin Hunter Band in tow (24 Jun). Edinburgh finally gets its collective shit together, in fact overcompensating with two consecutive metal festivals: firstly, Metalhead Weekend at the Ark (27 Jun), featuring Dunfermline’s Aggressus amongst others. This is eagerly followed by the GBH Thrash festival at the GRV (28 Jun) which sports and international cast including Denmark’s Lipid, Ireland’s Visceral Attack, Pitiful Reign from Hull, River Freshney from sunny Grimsby, Lifeless from Middlesbrough and native outfits Circle of Tyrants and Necropolis. A filling meal indeed. Fortunately that gives you a couple of days to get your denims nicely ironed, just in time for AC/ DC dressing like school children and gay bartenders at Hampden Park (30 Jun) and rocking your muthafuckin’ socks off. See you down the front.

CMY

June 2009

THE SKINNY 53

CLUBS

Under the Radar Investment bankers by day, Hi-NRG heroes by night, Rosie Davies discovers just why Den Haan are anal for analogue sound SEARCH for Den Haan on Myspace, but beware of straying too far. Nick DenHaan, an overweight drummer from the Deep South, is the unfortunate second hit on the search engines. His page offers a lonely video of a dog humping a stuffed toy, and a slideshow of him and his mates posing on cars in sweat pants. With guns. There’s the obligatory spattering of low quality XXX adverts featuring lip-linered girls in cheap underwear. This is seedy territory. Back in the safety of the genuine Den Haan page is the welcome return to form of original retro sleaze. This is the stuff Nick DenHaan was brought up on. It’s Hi-NRG italo disco straight out of a 1970s porno, set in a wood-panelled Spanish motel, with the stars strewn all over the grainy flyers. There’s pouts, heels, and tanned guys with ’taches. Thing is, though, they sound really good. Every hand-clap, every Glitter-esque foot stomp, every masculine grunt (there’s a few) is presented to you so crisply, so enticingly. Hell, if you’ve got a mirror and a pair of tinted aviators, stick them on. These guys are making the genre irresistible. It’s taken a while, but it’s time for Den Haan. By day, Matt Aldworth is a part-time technical analyst for an investment bank. “He’s a banker! Ha!” quips Gardi, a freelance assistant film director. “The people in my work know I’m in a band but I don’t really talk about it,” Matt says. “I only do it to pay bills and keep my mind active. It gets me out of bed at 6am every weekday.” By night, they are Glasgow’s hardest working music geeks. And, as they happily admit, everything suddenly seems to be coming together for them. “At the beginning of 2008, we were doing a lot of work. All our spare time was devoted to it. Then the first record came out, we got a bit of interest, and since then it’s just been gathering force. It’s growing arms and legs all the time.” Last month’s launch event for their record label, The Courier Of Death, was a celebration of the move away from bigger, institutional club nights towards cosy, specialist parties. It also saw a room of ecstatically sweaty men punching the air to latest single Release the Beast, what must surely be an ode to sexually frustrated male exhibitionists across the world. “You’re allowed to sing along to this one. It’s OK,” deadpans Gardi as the opening stomp of Gary Glitter’s Rock and Roll Part 2 kicks in. His tongue-in-cheek humour pulls the crowd back down to earth: sparkling Euro disco-pop it may be, but they’re dancing to it in a basement down a dirty Glaswegian alley. It’s probably best not to take it too seriously. “I don’t like the way that when so much of a fad is created out of something, it can die a death quite quickly,” says Gardi. “Our music’s Hi-NRG, disco, italo, yes, but we’re never going to tie ourselves down

to a certain style. What comes out is up to the way we’re feeling at that time. We know when we’ve got a song in a certain position and it feels right. Whenever it gets a little too serious we go for a pint and turn it on its head...” Their shows, however, do bring together two serious obsessions: finding the perfect equipment to make that authentic retro sound, and making live music, well, live again. “When people just plug in a laptop, it sounds terrible, like an MP3 or something,” says Gardi. “For years in the 90s you could just play with a DAT tape made in a studio, that whole DIY ethic. But now I think people are sick of hearing tinny sounds on a laptop.” They use analogue synths - “the real equipment” which they’ve been collecting since they were 12. “It’s

"I THINK PEOPLE ARE SICK OF HEARING TINNY SOUNDS ON A LAPTOP.” GARDI now collected into this kind of Starship Enterprise of equipment in my flat. That’s probably why I’m single. It has always been an issue with anyone I’ve been out with...” Who better to impress with sound geekery than Glasgow’s foremost purveyor of all things credible, JD Twitch? “The first time we played [Optimo] we put loads of effort into the stage set, visuals and sound, and Twitch just said, ‘Fuck, the sound quality is way better than an actual club’.” So was it just a case of right place, right time? Matt, who has known the Optimo guys since 2000, released his solo album, as Crème De Menthe, on their label OSCarr in 2005. From there, it was on to the hallowed Optimo Hogmanay slot. “This year’s was amazing, the biggest gig we’d ever done. We are fortunate getting that. But at the end of the day, if they hadn’t liked our stuff, they wouldn’t have bothered with us.” THE NEW ALBUM, GODS FROM OUTER SPACE, IS EXPECTED AT THE END OF THIS YEAR. WWW.MYSPACE.COM/DENHAAN

HOT TOWN, SUMMER IN THE CITY THE recent spell of good weather seems to have put people in the mood for the muchanticipated festival season slightly sooner than usual. The sheer number of events being hosted across the UK reached saturation point last year, with a number of festivals failing to reappear this time around. Twenty-four hour, inner city affairs such as The Wee Chill and Stag and Dagger have unsurprisingly returned, as there is always going to be a demand for excellent line-ups in familiar venues without the need for travel. Over on the website we have an extended

54 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

preview of the world’s biggest electronic music festival, Sonar 09, taking place in Barcelona from 18-20 June and featuring artists such as Moderat, Ebony Bones, Richie Hawtin and The Gaslamp Killer. We'll have full coverage online and in print once Sonar is underway. Closer to home we have Rockness in full swing between 12 and 14 June, with nights hosted by Soma, Ed Banger and the Sub Club. Flip over to page 57 for an interview with Rockness Friday evening headliner Funk D’Void.[Chris Duncan]

DJ CHART HUSHPUPPY 1. The Torandos - Hot Pot "Classic 1964 Joe Meek weirdness to kick things off".

2. k.i.d. - Don’t Stop (Groove)

6. Maral Salmassi - My Shit Is On (Zero Cash Mix) "Bionically bouncy, beefy and cheeky."

"Irresistible synth boogie sing-a-long."

7. Hey Today - If I Was Wonderman

3. The Faint - Battle Hymn for Children

(Vanshe Tech Remix) "BangGang kids with Van She remixing? GET OUT!"

(Tensnake Remix) "Throbbing remix in a dark mystic/cosmic style."

4. Patrick Cowley - Get a Little (Long Version) "Gay hi-NRG at its sleazy best."

5. Clasixx - I’ll Get You Feat. Jeppe (Royal Rumble Remix) "Total slice of the summer to come."

8. Alex Metric - Caller "Rock hard and zooper jackin’. Metric is one to watch."

9. Einzeller - Schwarzfahrer (Boys Noize) "Brilliant old fashioned teutonic electro-rock." 10. Moebius - Light My Fire "Genius cosmic rock Doors cover, kicks in like no other version..."

CLUBS

New Heights Yuksek: Remixer, DJ, studio hermit and unintentional hero of teenage stoners from Istanbul.

A COUPLE of times a week, via his Myspace page, Yuksek recieves a mesage from Istanbul or Ankara saying “Hey, know what? Yuksek means “high” in Turkish!”. No, Yuksek didn’t know this when he chose the name by instinct four years ago. Instead he selected it partly for its sound and also to buck the trend of English-sounding names that are common in electronic music. In recent months, the pseudonym has been collecting an ever-growing halo of attention, and not just for his inability to Google his choosen moniker before releasing an album under it. Yuksek, a former signing to Birdy Nam Nam’s label and a favourite of bloggers across the globe, has remixed the likes of Mika, Kaiser Chiefs, Ghostface Killah and Tahiti 80 recently. His intense live sets involve switching between his collection of vintage keyboards and FX board, and have set alight concert venues, clubs and festivals all over the world. Yuksek spent his youth practising piano several hours a day whilst listening to The Beatles, Gainsbourg, NWA, De La Soul and Nirvana. At the age of 17 Yuksek made the move to not only listen, but create. Over the years his reputation grew as one of Reims’ central pop figures, as he played bass guitar and wrote with electro-rock combo Klanguage. He soon found a passion for the art of making a variety of sounds which lead him to produce the next Birdy Nam Nam

and The Bewitched Hands albums. In time, Yuksek inevitably discovered electronic music where he became a devoted fan of Warp Records’ output. Nowadays, Yuksek successfully manages to mix pop hooks into a frenzy of dancefloor devastation. Post-punk riffs merge into acid loops, whilst disco grooves meet house beats and catchy melodies. He is a distinctly electronic based artist with a heart of pure pop gold. So what’s the secret of his finely tuned tracks? His secret studio must surely have an influence, hidden away from the eyes of passers-by, in the basement of a basement, deprived of internet and mobile phone contact. Here Yuksek allows his tracks to develop into rich tapestries, using his talent for twisted FX and electrifying changes of tack in order to create his works. The hidden location of the studio that spawned the material for his debut album also gave birth to the title, Away From The Sea. Yuksek is now signed to Sound of Barclay in Paris, the more pop-orientated Fiction label (historic home of The Cure, and now host to Whites Lies, Snow Patrol, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Kate Nash) released the album in February.[Chris Duncan] YUKSEK APPEARS AT DEATH DISCO ON 20 JUN ALONGSIDE DJ FEADZ AND ORGASMIC. 10.30PM-3AM, £14/£7 WWW.DEATHDISCO.INFO

253 ARGYLE STREET, GLASGOW 0141 565 1000 WWW.DEATHDISCO.INFO

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 55

Clubs

Previews Cooly G

Boy 8-Bit and XXXChange

Ballers Social Club, Stereo, 12 Jun

HYP?, Sub Club, 26 Jun

The workaholics at LuckyMe must be living off caffeine because they just don’t seem to stop scouring the country for innovative new artists. On this occasion they welcome the beautiful and talented Cooly G to the decks. The London DJ / producer has recently signed to HyperDub after Kode 9 was blown away by her smooth blend of dub, minimalist and house. This event will be the release party for her debut 12” on the label Bok Bok and Jackmaster will be on duty to provide generous helpings of dubstep, house, Baltimore and bassline. Bok Bok runs the infamous NightSlugs parties in London and Jackmaster is the man behind Glasgow institution Numbers. They have both been recording mixes for Vice, Kiss FM and LuckyMe so get yourself along to find out what the hype is all about. As always, the LuckyMe DJs will be doing what it takes to make the walls shake. [David McNamara]

A two-pronged attack from HYP? this month with two fine examples of contemporary electronic music acts. First up is Xxxchange, who made his name as the production half of booty bass party starters Spank Rock, fashioning the era defining electronic beats that made their debut album YoYoYoYoYo... a modern hip-hop classic that appealed to both electro club kids and die hard hip-hop fans alike. Boy 8-Bit has dropped the biggest of bombs since exploding into the club scene consciousness in the last year. Brilliant releases on taste-making labels Mad Decent and Trouble & Bass as well as some carefully selected and devastatingly effective remixes have ensured his rep gets bigger all the time. A forthcoming album on Diplo’s Mad Decent imprint will showcase his artistic endeavours to their fullest, as well as his ear for what makes the floor bounce. [Anna Seale]

11pm-3am, £5 before 12am/ £7 after, www.myspace.

Support comes from A Lu Fu.

com/ballerssocialclub

11pm-3am, £10/£12

Glitter Klinik

Pat Mahoney

Confusion is Sex, Studio 24, 5 Jun

Let It Bleed & The Deep End, Snafu, 6 Jun

Despite having only two nights under its belt so far, Confusion is Sex is already making a name for itself as one of the most diversive club nights in Edinburgh. On 5 June they present Glitter Klinik, a Berlin based trio specialising in gayer-than-cum-on-a-moustache pop. Their infamous live act takes place within Studio 24, which for one night only is transformed into a David Lynch set with burlesque dancers taking to the stage all evening. DJ support comes from the excellent Wasabi Disco who will provide a set of sleazy disco stitched together with a collection of wrong sounds. Highly, highly recommended and the perfect complement to an evening that promises to “create an environment and not a a music night”. Confusion is Sex returns on 19 June at the Bongo Club with [D-66] and DJ slots from Dolby Anol and Come. [Chris Duncan]

The hip sounds of Brooklyn and the Death From Above label continue to infiltrate the Granite City throughout June with a night of the finest disco ever to emerge from a record bag this side of a loft party. Let It Bleed and The Deep End join forces and purses to present Pat Mahoney of DFA as Special Disco Version alongside Q Burns, Abstract Message and Funky Transport. James Murphy and Pat Mahoney of LCD Soundsystem come together to make Special Disco Version, either DJing together or individually. Pat appears solo on 6 June with esteemed support coming from the Sunshine State’s well-established remixer Q Burns Abstract. Expect deep house, sleazy disco, soul and funk rarities as well as a great deal of terminal record collection envy. Come down, dance the night away, spend all of the following Sunday on Discogs trying to track down that record. [Chris Duncan]

11pm-3am, £6 www.myspace.com/CONFUSIONISSEXCLUB

Battant Optimo, Sub Club, 28 Jun

Sat 06 LOUISE MACBETH + RANDOM GUY + LEAN TALES Sun 07 MISS THE OCCUPIER + COME IN TOKYO + WE, THE LAST MEN Mon 08 DAVE HOUSE + A BROKEN ROBOT + PARETO + HIDDEN LEAVES Tue 09 THE SWEET JANES + SPRING T.V. Thu 11 SJ ESAU + ASTHMATIC ASTRONAUGHT + LIFESHOWS + POINT TO C Fri 12 THE BARIENT SEA + JONNY TERRELL Sat 13 THE FLOORSTOMPERS Sun 14 BLACKBERRY JACK + THE SCHEMES + GUEST Tue 16 AUTOSAFARI + SAVAGE REJECTS + GUEST Wed 17 THE VERDICT + SPLIT SWORDS + GUEST Thu 18 TELEVISED CRIMEWAVE Fri 19 THE PATRIOTS + DIRTY VIOLETS + FREUDIAN SLOP Sat 20 PROCEED + MIND SET A THREAT + GUESTS Sun 21 EMMA FOREMAN + GUESTS Mon 22 SONS OF THE MORNING STAR + GUESTS Tue 23 BREACHING COPYRIGHT + GUESTS Wed 24 THE BLACK LIGHTS + GUESTS 73 Queen Street, Glasgow G1 3BZ Thu 25 THE MURDERBURGERS + HELLER STATE + BURNOUT 27 + THE Tel: 0141 221 4851 CELLOPHANES www.twistedwheelglasgow.com Fri 26 THE MICKEY 9’S + THE COVERGIRLS www.myspace.com/the_twisted_wheel Tue 30 4DAYWEEKEND + JUNKYARD SHIFT (tbc)

French three-piece Battant are signed to long-time Optimo partners in crime KilltheDJ, the Parisian label that FRIreleased 6 MARCH The STrike NiNeTeeNS Optimo’s excellent How to Kill the DJ, Pt.2 compili& The killing Time – 8pm, £5 ation back in 2004. The trio play a rattling brand of sullen, pop-punk, pulling influences from Suicide,Club, Dead SATjagged 7 MARCH Super AdveNTure and Siouxsie andSnowball the Banshees. Their£5 debut SixKennedys people Away & Tom – 8pm, album No Head was released in February to excellent THU 12 MARCH rob Weatherall MCCulloCh, reviews, and led Andrew to describe them Spider Monkey, eskimo Go – 8pm, £2 as “one of the best new bands going at the moment”. dark and captivating sound this may well be one FRIWith 13aMARCH pArlor Mob, of the stand out performances of the White Ace, dirty Angel – 8pm, £5,summer. Take the opportunity to see and hear them first as they play their WED 18 MARCH TAlkiNG To STrANGerS, first exclusive Scottish dates. [Chris Duncan]

in 1993, Alex spent the rest of the nineties producing, recording and spinning records, eventually releasing his first 12” Omar S 001 in 2001. Due to its originality, Alex’s sound became an almost overnight sensation, with re-pressings of Omar S 002 growing into the thousands, the majority bought and distributed by Glasgow’s own Rub-A-Dub record shop. After establishing himself as a producer of great talent he also carved out a career as reputable DJ, and appears at Subculture on 20 June following the release of his Fabric mix that comprised of only his own tracks. Omar S also appears at Red Bull Music Academy on 19 - 20 June. [Chris Duncan]

fabulous ing lunch Thu 04 Mike Nisbetsit-in, winter warm 3.95! Thu 11 The Seventeenth Century at Brel for only £

Mon 15 mygaelic.com 11pm - 3am, £10 and your pals feeling hungry? Why don’t you Tue 16 Adriana + ColinYou Train tell your mates to GET STUFFED! WIth loads of Wed 17 Dead City Road big tasty dishes to choose from and all for only Thu 18 Jo Mango + Hafdis Huld £3.95*, Brel is the perfect lunchtime hotspot! More club Sun 21 Fete de la Musique *Available Monday to Friday lunchtimes previews and reviews Thu 25 Concrete Campfire from noon until 4pm! Sun 28 Rudy Alba

Ashton Lane 56 THE SKINNY June 2009

online theskinny.co.uk

39 Ashton Lane | Glasgow G12 8SG | 0141 342 4966

0141 342 4966 www.brelbarrestaurant.com

Herve Alternative, Cabaret Voltaire, 12 Jun

Glasgow’s Alt club night makes a hop, skip and jump from the V Club to Cabaret Voltaire in Edinburgh for the launch of its bi-monthly presence in Auld Reekie. Special guests include Herve and the Alt residents Derrick Burns and Jose in the main room while Kirk Douglas and Kid Sleazy perform in the second room. Herve has remixed the likes of Lily Allen, The Chemical Brothers, The Prodigy, New Young Pony Club and Roisin Murphy to great effect and also produces music under the aliases The Count and Speaker Junk. Well on his way to becoming a leader in his genre and a defining DJ of the past few years, this will be a rare treat to see Herve in an intimate venue. He may soon be selling out much larger venues if his success remains unhindered. [Anna Seale]

John knox Sex Club, Convoi exceptionel – 8pm, £4 11pm-3am, £9/£10 Battant Optimo in Edinburgh also play THU 19 MARCH AMber WilSoN, on 27 Jun at Cabaret Voltaire. 11pm-3am, £10 Cancel Winter – 8pm, £2 THU 26 MARCH SpArroW ANd The WorkShop , Ghost Omar S Wakes, Michael Fracasso – 8pm, £2, Holy vetacore, hindle Subculture, Sub Club, 20 Jun Dirty Hearts Club, Snafu, 4 Jun Famed his distinctively and much sought after Hailing from Brooklyn, Holy Ghost! are Nicholas Millhiser MON 30forMARCH oldraw roMANTiC killer bANd, elhouse doG, 8pm,productions £5, and–techno released on his own FXHE and Alex Frankel. The pair were formerly part of the label, Alex ‘Omar S’ Smith hails from Detroit. Making his DJ live rap group Automato whose debut was produced by SUN 5 APRIL 6 dAy rioT, debut at one of Joe Claussell’s early Manhattan club nights DFA’s James Murphy and Tim Goldsworthy. Holy Ghost! Gideon Conn, The French Wives – 8pm, £6

d! get stulyftafstye ,

LIVE ACOUSTIC Enjoy a

10pm-3am, advance tickets £10

are now spearheading the current disco revival that is fast engulfing dance floors across the world. Holy Ghost! are signed to DFA Records, the legendary New York label that boasts artists such as LCD Soundsystem, Hot Chip, Hercules and Love Affair, Gucci Soundsystem and The Juan MacLean. Most recently Holy Ghost! have completed brilliant remixes for Moby, Goblin City, Cut Copy amoungst others. Before they embark on a live tour in 2009, they’re taking a trip around Europe, playing an extended DJ tour that is set to feature a mix of old and new, drawing links between pure disco tracks and the latest electronic releases. [Chris Duncan] 10pm-3am, £5/£4

Jaco Justice finds Scottish techno expat Funk D'Void on the cusp of another European adventure Having resided in Barcelona since the precious days of the peseta, Lars Sandberg has witnessed the Catalan capital evolve into one of Europe’s prime party locations. Certainly, for one long June weekend each year, when the fiesta of advanced music and multimedia Sonar takes over the art compound MACBA and exhibition centre FIRA (and every club, bar and beach chiringuito for that matter), Barcelona can claim host to one of the most desired and recognised electronic-based events on the global clubbing calender. However that still leaves plenty more rave weeks in the year to fill - an issue currently rattling between the ears of Senor Sandberg aka Funk D’Void aka Francois Dubois... and also know as one of the key protagonists in the success of his original hometown’s seminal record imprint for well over the past decade - namely Glasgow’s Soma Records. He took a few moments from the Barna-based production studio he shares with upcoming Irish talents Chymera and Sian to let The Skinny deeper into the dance music ambassadorial role he has forged into as “a way of giving back” to his latin home... “I’m currently rushed off my feet getting ready to open a club just up the coast, but still easily accessible from central Barcelona. It will be the city’s only specifically built outdoor club, some 2000sqm and open five days a week, Wednesday to Saturday. A dark techno mausoleum,” he chuckles with potent intent. Alluding to its seaside access and one of his favourite touring destinations, the club will be named Kanna - Japanese for beach - and located towards the outer-limit of the tram line which opened for the ’92 Olympics (further up past the Forum, for the Primavera fans out there). And with Lars’ vast DJ/ producer/label contact list, the potential for the summer venue, at this stage, is quite frightening, what with Barcelona’s excellent communications and close proximity to Ibiza. (Wee Skinny exclusive: notorious chaps Sven, Ricardo and Luciano will be appearing during Sonar). The Funk D’Void (techno) and Francois Dubouis (deep house) split producing personality has, well, apart from giving his booking agent a pleasant ambiguity to solve, meant that his DJ touring schedule is as swamped as ever. Opening a brand new venue is no easy feat, either personally or with the law-makers and their recent attitudes to clubbing: “The local government have been

in a panic for the past five years trying to ‘clean up’ what they perceive to be the anti-tourism blights of late night sound-systems, rogue skaters, stag party drunkards, pick-pocketing and prostitution,” he says. “They basically wrongly targeted bars with decks and stripped their DJ licenses. Thankfully our technology was one step ahead with the advent of playing live on a laptop so that saved some of the key small venues around the Gotic.” The current gloom in global economics, however, has inadvertently allowed licensing confidence in the approach to this venture: “Our location is actually under the jurisdiction of poblé Sant Andria - which means a separate mayor to Barcelona city,” says Lars. “I went to

"Fuck Berlin... Barcelona has a beach!” meet with him. In today’s global climate he agreed that we can’t be too restrictive with trying to attract the better elements of clubland (and the obvious tourism benefits), and that the shock tactics of the city to cure anti-social behaviour had been detrimental to how Barcelona has been perceived around Europe. I can foresee a ‘model of Berlin’ approach over the next few years... much more relaxation again.” You can’t help agree that this will aid creativity levels in a city already blessed with wonderful cuisine and climate. Indeed, another of Lars’ sidelines has already been one step ahead in the promotion of Barcelona. Spotted on the backs of clubbers from as far as The Big Chill in England to WMC in Miami, his range of strapline T-shirts have been claiming “Minimal DJ’s have small decks” and “Fuck Berlin... Barcelona has a Beach!”. If only the politicians took such a direct and honest approach. Funk D’Void plays Rockness on 12th June. www.funkdvoid.com

Playing with 7 Inches Hushpuppy is the creator of one of Glasgow's biggest success stories, RPZ, the club night previously known as Record Playerz. Now in its seventh year and still selling out almost every week, he explains to Chris Duncan how it all came about. “I DJed at Divine for 13 years and then began Abnormals Anonymous in the CCA in 2001. I started Abnormals Anonymous because at the time nothing catered for the gay scene outside of the Polo lounge. The straight community doesn’t have that issue, so Abnormals Anonymous was the antithesis of that. Once it made its point, I killed it off. There was a ‘Death in Clubland’ night where it ended. Abnormals Anonymous was overtly political, it was all about performance, live video, art installations, sloganeering and queer theory. It had a very specific agenda. Record Playerz was different, it began with me DJing under the name Hushpuppy along with Hi-Fi Sean. There was also the band Record Playerz which was the two of us and Rachel Graham. As a club night, Record Playerz was aimed at being a party without the strong statement of Abnormals Anonymous, instead it was just a bit quirky.” With the tongue-in-cheek flyers and ever changing playlist Record Playerz is one of the staples of Glasgow’s club scene. Recently renamed to RPZ after Hi-Fi Sean moved to London, the name change was an attempt to highlight the different direction RPZ is now moving in.

“When Hi-Fi Sean left, the club night had become separated from the band. When Tom (fellow RPZ DJ Bonjour Boi) joined it changed the musical direction of the night. We had become a different thing so we abbreviated it.” “I think RPZ manages to expand the horizons of the gay scene outside of it. The Art School is this great, mixed environment. RPZ is not a gay night, but the Art School is very relaxed. People who aren’t into it aren’t going to stick around. Some people walk in, take one look at the projections of half naked men on the wall and you just know they’re never going to come back. We used to have images of women on the walls, but there was this total feminist undercurrent in the Art School where some people would just object to any images of women being displayed. It was a very 1970s mindset. I tried explaining that a lot of the women in the club were wearing less clothing that those on the walls but people still complained. Eventually I replaced the images with ones of nearly naked men in order to play with the boundaries of what was allowed. There’s never been any complaints since.” For those who do choose to stay and bask in the

day-glo colours of the glowing unclothed torsos upon the walls, rewards are in store. Previous guests at RPZ have included Siriousmo, Vanshe Technologic, Bang Gang Deejays and the first ever Scottish appearance from the Scissor Sisters. “It’s always been cheap to get into RPZ, there’s never been an extra charge to see bands play. There’s also always been an attempt to book people from outside the UK who haven’t been here before. We may begin booking DJs again in the future. We usually found that concept odd as they can be hit and miss, unlike band demos where you know what you’re getting. One option is to book acts and have them play their own productions and mixes.” “As well as continuing RPZ there are plans for a new night that I’m calling Infinity. It’ll mostly be italo, electric pop and foreign disco. Visuals will play a big part in it so I’m still looking for a new venue, but hopefully it’ll launch around September or October.” RPZ takes place in The Vic Bar every Thursday night, 11pm - 3am. cubalibrealcoholiks.ownlog.com

www.myspace.com/recordplayerzclub

June 2009

THE SKINNY 57

Clubs

Keeping the Beaches Happy

Glasgow music Tue 02 Jun Aborted, The Acacia Strain, Salt The Wound Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £9

Death metal

Black Sister

The Northwestern, The French Wives, Palace Ballet

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Indie rock

A Jokers Rage

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Captain’s Rest, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Rock funk

The Saturdays

Depeche Mode slaughtered, live

Dicelines & SocksOff present: Anna Meldrum, Be A Familiar, Mitchell Museum

Metronomy

Alt. indie

Thrash

SECC, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £10

Electro pop pleasures

All The Young Nudes

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Eclectiv (Dub Chieftain, Zener Diode, Unknown Forces of Everyday Life) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Weekly eclectic collective.

oswald

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Falsetto fuelled rock pop

Drive carefully, The Paraffins

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Scratchy, catchy tape music from electroluvs

Wed 03 Jun My Passion, Summerlin Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £6

Pop punk and electro

Broken Records

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £7.50

Seven-piece indie folk Edinburgh mainstays

Napoleon in Rags, Euan Platter Rio Café, 20:00–00:00, Free

Indie rock and blues

The Admiral, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Mono Jazz

Mono, 20:00–23:00, Free

Weekly jazz night with the resident house four-piece, plus guests.

Revelations (Hayze, The Gazettas, Flatback Four, Hello Pirates) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Weekly indie.

Tyrant lizard kings, Dead Otter 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Stoner rock

Thu 04 Jun

Live at The Mill (Mick Hargan & The Propositions, Maeve O’ Boyle) The Mill Glasgow @ Òran Mór, 20:00–22:30, Free

Showcase double-bills for the best up-and-coming acts. For more information on these gigs go to: http://www.themill-live.com/gigguide. aspx

Concrete Campfire (Mike Nisbet) Brel, 20:00–22:00, Free

Acoustic session

Cryptic Nights: Any Color Black CCA, 20:00–22:00, £5

Glasgow-based electro rock, backed by a contemporary string quartet

58 THE SKINNY June 2009

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Acoustic

Vinyl Play

Coholic, The Only Jones

Yooks, ming ming and the ching chings 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £tbc

Indie

The Turning Wire, Jokermann, Bruce Nicol

The Drawing Room, 21:00–00:00, Free

Alt. indie

Fri 05 Jun The Privates Hammond Orchestra

Maggie Mays, 17:00–20:00, Free

Surf jazz

Pyschobabe

Stereo, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Pop

Maria Taylor, Whispertown 2000

Three bands of common influence/ genre take you on a weekly romp

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Screamo and electronica

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £5

Progressive

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Goldheart Assembly, Ten To Five Project, Acutones

Rio Café, 20:00–00:00, Free

Shut Up and Eat Your Music

Brokencyde, Kill Paradise, Synthetic Season Ivory Blacks, 19:00–23:00, £10

The Salon Society

Rock emo metail

Alasdair Roberts Horse

Soul funk rock McChuills, 20:00–23:00, Free

Rock pop

The Cairos, Semper Fi, Tragic Thieves

Maggie Mays, 20:00–23:00, £5

Indie rock

Amok, Kritikill Mass, Necropolis

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Doom laden thrash metal

Eyes Wide Open (Thomas)

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4)

Garage, psych, freakbeat, rock n roll.

Sat 06 Jun Steve Kettley’s Odd Times Brel, 15:00–18:00, Free

Classic Grand, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Jazz contortions

JS Promotions present: The Damned (The Alarm with Henry Cluney)

THE NEXT BIG THING (Airspiel, Johnny And The Giros, The Digzys, The Japanese Mafia, Castaway, Alex Wayt, Sneaky Pete, The Tuesday Night Girls, The Cairos, Ewan Butler, Acoustic Butterfly, Calum Muir, Norquay, Kevin McGuire)

ABC, 19:00–23:00, £17.50

Punk rock

PM Music present: The Skinflints ABC, 19:00–23:00, £6

Indie Rock

Blue October US

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £10

Texan rock

o2 Academy, 18:00–22:30, £10

Showcase

Sounds of Avalon (Attic Lights, Alto Elite, Popup, Echo & The Bunnymen DJ set) QMU, 19:00–03:00, £10

Organised by Ann’s Angels, the gig aims to raise funds for oesophageal cancer research charity, Ochre, and the Balcraig Foundations’ Kenya Christian Homes Orphanages

De La Soul

The Arches, 20:00–23:00, £6

Ska and reggae

Goosedubbs, The Trade, 60 Persons, The Tenemants The V Club, 20:00–23:00, £5

Alt. indie rock

CG presents: Louise MacBeth, Random Guy & Lean Tales

The Hold Up, Alan Panther & The Energy Treadmill, Sound Over Silence, Junkyard Shift

Glasgow-based indie pop four-piece

Alt. rock

The Twisted Wheel, 19:00–23:00, £5

Katy Perry

Barrowlands, 19:00–23:00, sold out

Fruit flavoured chapsticks at the ready girls

Perfect Violation, Sonic Assault, Lost Persona, The Assassins Ivory Blacks, 19:00–23:00, £6

Glam metal

YRock present: Models For The Radio (The Dunderheids, Lost In Oxygen) ABC, 19:00–23:00, £6

Alternative Rock Punk

Major Minor presents: Cruiser, My Final Wish The Flying Duck, 19:30–23:00, £5

Punk and garage

Howard Eliott Payne, Charlene Soria, Ewan Butler

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £8

Bluesy folk

Massacre Cave, Minus Won, John Hailstones, Borborigmy

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Maggie Mays, 20:00–23:00, £5

Tinseltown, Gary Johnstone Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

rock

Seditionaries, The ExMen, The Dirty Cuts, iamchemist DJ set 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Electro pop and sleazy synths

Sun 07 Jun Serpico, Special Guests Classic Grand, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Rock Punk

Triple G present: Mastodon ABC, 19:00–23:00, £15

Metal Alternative

Teitur, The Seventeenth Century, Empires

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £8

Folk rock

Cherbourg, Derek Meins, James William Hindle & Calvin Halliday

Death metal

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

B Real (Cypress Hill), Psycho Realm, Damaged Goods

No Tribe

The Arches, 20:00–23:00, £19

Rap

Alt. folk rock

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Throw rocks against your ear drums. Weekly.

The Rutlands (Annie Stevenson, Ohio, Little Extras) Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Indie pop

The Void, Cry Over Billionaires

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Alternative rock

TWS Music presents: Miss the Occupier, Come in Tokyo & We, The Last Men

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Local talent showcase

the ocean fracture, the whisky works, citagazi, penguins kill polarbears 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Post-hardcore

Mon 08 Jun Michael Simons

Tchai-Ovna House of Tea, 19:00–22:00, £2

folk, blues and beyond

Lady Sovereign

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £9

Louise Harman returns with her sophmore effort, Jigsaw

Go Button

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Alt. folk

Acoustic Bazooka (Jill Leighton, ACIDdica, Big Bad Bad, Chris Blair) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Weekly acoustic night.

Nitrogen Promotions presents: Dave House, A Broken Robot, Pareto & Hidden Leaves

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, £6

Indie punk

Tue 09 Jun The Blizzards, The Roshambos, Alkotron Ivory Blacks, 19:00–23:00, £6

Ska and pop

Unicorn Kid, Soft Toy Emergency, Crayons, Skitten

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £5

Electro pop and happy hardcore

All The Young Nudes

VV Brown

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £7.50

Indie pop punk

MC RUT

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

A.k.a Middle Class Rut

Elton John

SECC, 20:00–23:00, £75, £50, £35

Only live Scottish show of 2009

Mono Jazz

Mono, 20:00–23:00, Free

Weekly jazz night with the resident house four-piece, plus guests.

Post War Years Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Indie rock

Revelations (Shimmer, Universal You, The Reckoning) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Weekly indie.

Thu 11 Jun Y-Rock present:

Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Bands to be confirmed

Lissy Trullie, The 123s, Wilburnsilver

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £6.50

Androgyny pop

Izzak and the Tinker, Emma Curran, Dean Queasy

The Buff Club, 20:00–02:00, Free

Acoustic pop

Concrete Campfire

Brel, 20:00–23:00, Free Acoustic session

Miss The Occupier

Firewater, 20:00–23:00, Free

Weekly showcase

Shut Up and Eat Your Music

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Three bands of common influence/ genre take you on a weekly romp

Mischeif Brew, Jonny One Lung, Dave Hughes & The Renegade Folk 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Folkin’ smokin’

The I.D. Parade, Kat Healy, Rachel Dawick & Nick Lewis, Steve Adams

The Drawing Room, 21:00–00:00, Free

Boyzone

Information Libre

SOMEYOUNGPEDRO

Mono Jazz

The ‘Better’ 2009 Tour

Monthly indie showcase

A tiny spanish pop idol, no doubt

Weekly jazz night with the resident house four-piece, plus guests.

SECC, 19:30–23:00, £32.50

Telegraphs, Lights Action, The Japanese Mafia, Belgrade

Kids On Bridges, RBRBR, The Delaneys

Alt. rock

Last Corinthians

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £6

CG Music presents: The Barents Sea & Jonny Terrell

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, £5

Acoustic

Sons Of The Morning Star, Ampersand, John Neville Junior Maggie Mays, 20:00–23:00, £5

Blues and rock

Universal You

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Rock pop

Unknown Method The V Club, 20:00–23:00, £5

Indie rock

Wreckin pit: Blitzkid, The Ruined, The Terrors 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

US horror punk

BALKANARAMA (Erdogan Orkestra, Kuchke, Mrs DJ Grandma Staflaš, Black Cat)

The Arches, 21:00–03:00, £9, £7 b4 10.30pm

Balkan, gypsy, klezmer and East European music.

Sat 13 Jun Jess Abrams Quartet Brel, 15:00–18:00, Free

Edinburgh-based New York vocalist

PM Music present: Day of Days ABC, 19:00–23:00, £6

Alternative

Òran Mór, 19:30–22:30, £5

Rock

RML presents: The Floorstompers

The Twisted Wheel, 19:30–23:00, £5

Soul

Eclectiv (Tronic Takeover - Kid Quaalude)

The Offbeat presents: SJ Esau, Asthmatic Astronaught and Lifeshows & Point to C

The ‘Better’ 2009 Tour

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Local talent showcase

mason summers

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Indie rock

Wed 10 Jun BRITBUS TOUR (La Fontaines, Val Verde, John Carson, Philadelphia Mainline, The Brogues) o2 Academy, 19:00–23:00, £4

The Twisted Wheel, 22:00–03:00, £4

Hip hop, folk and funk

Fri 12 Jun Mixedtape Launch

Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Bands to be confirmed

DF Concerts present: Jarvis ABC, 19:00–23:00, £17.50

Indie Pop

Metal2TheMasses Heat: FINAL

Classic Grand, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

SECC, 19:30–23:00, £32.50

Pirate Music presents the Trade CD Launch with Indie DJ Collective (The Trade, Satellite Underground, Would be Kings and TV Revo) Soundhaus, 19:30–02:30, £7 (£6)

Woodenbox with a fist full of fivers, Wilson Tan, The Parsonage

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £6

PM Music present: The Ghosties

Rock

Indie Rock

Progressive indie

ABC, 19:00–23:00, £6

Poetically acoustic five-piece

Psykick Dancehall Present (Jazzfinger, Blood Stereo, The Hunter Gracchus, and Towering Breaker) CCA, 20:00–01:00, £5

Scottish Samba Showcase IV (Muleketu) QMU, 21:00–02:00, £9

A French Samba-Reggae band performing on stage with local bateria SambaYaBamba and east coast rivals Edinburgh Samba School in the West End Festival’s annual pre parade party.

Sun 14 Jun Just Jack

The Arches, 19:00–22:00, £10

North London indie electro popper

West End Festival: Orkestra Del Sol Òran Mór, 19:00–22:30, £5

Soul

Viking Moses, Golden Ghost, My Kappa Roots, Groaner, Wols The Admiral, 19:00–23:00, £5

Rock, country and soul

Raygun, What The Heroes Say, Decoy Rock and soul

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Religo black metal

Das Filth (Punto The Feef) Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Electro pop rock

McChuills, 20:00–23:00, Free

Weekly acoustic night.

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £tbc

TWS presents: Blackberry Jack, The Schemes

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Local talent showcase

Luxury Car

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Indie electro pop

Mon 15 Jun Michael Simons folk, blues and beyond

SECC, 19:30–23:00, £32.50

Boyle et al

We Were Promised Jetpacks, Lions

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £6

Fat Cat golden boys

Punk rock

KASABIAN

Òran Mór, 19:00–22:30, Free

o2 Academy, 19:00–23:00, sold out

Acoustic session

Jon Allen

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £8

Classic rock

All The Young Nudes

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Nacional

Indie rockers promote their new LP, The West Rider Pauper Lunatic Asylum

Pcl presents: The Thermals (Le Reno Amps, Bronto Skylift, Deadotter) Stereo, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Alternative Indie

Post-punk indie

Hire: Bands tbc

Adriana, Colin Train

Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Brel, 20:00–23:00, £5

Bands to be confirmed

Acoustic showcase of tracks from debut album, Coming Home

The Beat, Esperanza

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £15

Eclectiv (Satellite Dub, Sister Blades and Kvetch)

Ska and reggae

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Concrete Campfire (Jo Mango, Hafdis Huld)

Weekly eclectic collective.

TWS presents: AUTOSAFARI, Savage Rejects

Brel, 20:00–22:00, Free

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Local talent showcase

Nuts and seeds: T.I.T.S., Vars of Litchi

Acoustic session

Live at The Mill (Acrylic Iqon, Rosco) The Mill Glasgow @ Òran Mór, 20:00–22:30, Free

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Showcase double-bills for the best up-and-coming acts. For more information on these gigs go to: http://www.themill-live.com/gigguide. aspx

American ladies of rock

Wed 17 Jun pcl presents: The Thermals

The French Wives

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Stereo, 19:00–23:00, £8

Indie pop

West End Festival: Beerjacket, French Wives Òran Mór, 19:30–22:30, £5

RML & DFC presents: Televised Crimewave

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, £5

General Fiasco, Nevada Base, The Strands

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £6

Alt. rock

The Balladeers, Jenni Alpert, David Duffy

Indie rock

Shut Up and Eat Your Music

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Three bands of common influence/ genre take you on a weekly romp

The Fire & I

Firewater, 20:00–23:00, Free

Rio Café, 20:00–00:00, Free

Weekly showcase

Pop and rock

Throbbing Gristle The first ever Scottish performance, featuring two sets including a live soundtrack to a short film by Cerith Wyn Evans.DJ sets by JD Twith and JG Wilkes to follow

My Cousin I Bid You Farewell

Local talent showcase

SECC, 18:30–22:30, £30/40

West End Festival: Kid Canaveral

Tramway, 20:00–01:00, £20

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

The Priests

Tue 16 Jun

Indie

TWS presents: The Verdict, Split Swords

Thu 18 Jun

Rock

Throw rocks against your ear drums. Weekly.

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Weekly indie.

Initial itch

Alternative

Revelations (Hugo A Gogo, Eclusion, Our Smallest Adventures) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Brel, 20:00–23:00, Free

No Tribe (Slow Motion Replay, Harvest the Sun and Hippocampus)

Britain’s Got Talent 2009

Honey, Tom Laird

Rio Café, 20:00–00:00, Free

Òran Mór, 20:00–23:00, £5

Nick Garrie, Ally Kerr, Cineplexx Any Human Heart, Brand New Bag, Daybreak, Soulcircus

Showcase tour

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Gaelic music, part of the West End Festival

Tchai-Ovna House of Tea, 19:00–22:00, £2

Psychedelic pop

Acoustic Bazooka (John Tonner, Kevin McGuire, Stoo, Alan Cranney)

West End Festival: Voyage De Nuit

Folk

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Mono, 20:00–23:00, Free

Indie Rock

The Drones

West End Festival: Sticky Fingers

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Maeve Mackinnon, James Graham

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Promoting their latest album, The Visitor

Boyzone

TWS presents: The Sweet Janes & Spring T.V

Emotronic pop

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £6.50

o2 Academy, 19:00–23:00, £18

Alt. indie, rock and folk

Weekly eclectic collective.

Maggie Mays, 20:00–23:00, £5

UFO

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5

Itm?: how to swim, Jesus H Foxx 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Orchestral rock

Nevada Base, David Berkeley, John Langan, Emma Jane, Chris Blair

The Drawing Room, 21:00–00:00, Free

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Alt. indie, rock and folk

Dead City Radio

Juice Box (JOKERS OF THE SCENE)

Indie pop

Indie.

Alt. pop

Brel, 20:00–23:00, £5

The Flying Duck, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4)

More gigs than you can shake a bass player at

theskinny.co.uk/listings June 2009

THE SKINNY 59

Glasgow music West End Festival: Ross Clark & The Scarfs Go Missing, Sparrow and The Workshop, There Will Be Fireworks, The John Knox Sex Club Òran Mór, 19:30–23:00, £5

A riotous forray of the westcoast’s indie finest

Captain Slackship’s Mezzanine Allstars, Latino Rio Café, 20:00–00:00, Free

Reggae and dub

Nine Black Alps

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £7

Mancunian grunge

Emma Pollock

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Folky pop melancholy

Mono Jazz

Mono, 20:00–23:00, Free

Weekly jazz night with the resident house four-piece, plus guests.

Revelations (Fanzine Hero, Buffleheid, Beautful by Design) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Fri 19 Jun CG Music presents: The Patriots, Dirty Violets, Freudian Slop

The Twisted Wheel, 19:00–22:30, £5

Charming colloquial rock

Fortune of Sorrow, guests

Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Rock

ABC DIY present: The Retrofrets ABC, 19:00–23:00, £5

Alternative Rock

West End Festival: Chris & Thomas

Òran Mór, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Alt. folk

Would Be Kings, Special Guests

Classic Grand, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Alternative rock

Air Traffic

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £8

Alt rock

The Raw Kings, Wasted Radio, Bainbridge Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Rock zouk rock

The Vox Populi

Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Alternative rock

Nothing Rhymes With Orange, Rieser, San Toy Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5

Miami indie

Southpaw, Andy Tucker,The Scattered Family, The Scuffers

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

The Tenemants, The Meatmen Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Indie rock folk

The Tenemants, The Meatmen Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Indie rock folk

West End Festival: Big Vern & The Shootahs Òran Mór, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Alt. folk

BRAWTH (mr d)

Bon Accord, 20:30–23:00, Free

Glasgow’s premier soup-obsessed, dark, alt-country, harmony-driven folk band

Sun 21 Jun Brel, Concrete Campfire, Alliance Francaise de Glasgow present: Fete de la Musique (Le Reno Amps, Injuns, Marco Cafolo Quartet) Brel, 13:00–01:00, Free

Maggie Mays, 20:00–23:00, £5

A french tradition, bringing together artists of all genres and callibres in a free event

Lemuria, Kids Return

Academy Events present: Absent Elk

The Zips Alt. rock

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Yanky powerpop

Get The Blessing, Alyn Cosker Trio

The Arches, 21:00–00:00, £10

Part of Glasgow International Jazz festival

Sat 20 Jun

AM present: Wilburnsilver (The Rudiments, Franco Neon)

ABC, 19:00–23:00, £6 Alternative Indie Rock

Glasgow Live Events present: Proceed, Mind Set a Threat

The Twisted Wheel, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Rock and metal

SECC, 19:30–23:00, £30

UB40 frontman

One Eskimo, Shimmer, Playtone

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £5

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Part of the West End Festival

A Hawk and a Hacksaw The Arches, 20:00–23:00, £10

Part of Glasgow International Jazz Festival

No Tribe (Year Zero, Explain This and Hosemox) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Bugge Wesseltoft

The Arches, 20:00–23:00, £14

Part of Glasgow International Jazz festival

Bands to be confirmed

Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit, The Yeah Yous

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £11

Rock, blues and soul

The Moth and the Mirror, Endor, Hindle Wakes Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Alt. folk rock

Acoustic Bazooka (HavAGoHero, Jamie Keenan, Warwick, Lugi Strauss) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Weekly acoustic night.

TWS presents: Sons of the Morning Star

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Local talent showcase

Òran Mór, 19:30–23:00, £tbc

Scottish brogue laden indie

Acoustic Ladyland, Das Contras

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £8

Funk

All The Young Nudes

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Suicidal Girls, Pony Pack, Stragtfight

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Pop punk

Eclectiv (Plan 29, METALTECH ) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Weekly eclectic collective.

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

post-rock

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Wed 24 Jun

TWS presents: Emma Foreman

Brand New

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Barrowlands, 19:00–23:00, £16

Local talent showcase

Goth rock

West End Festival: Glasgow Gospel Choir

West End Festival: Emiliana Torrini

Gospel

Ethereal acoustic meanderings

Òran Mór, 19:30–23:00, £11.75

The Drawing Room, 21:00–00:00, Free

Alt. indie, rock and folk

Fri 26 Jun Octapidgeon presents: Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Bands to be confirmed

PM Music presents: Ghosts of Progress Stereo, 19:00–23:00, £6

Experiemental rock

Teejay present: The Jaks, The Black Arrows, Mellifluous, Neon ABC, 19:00–23:00, £5

Indie Rock

Lucky No. 9

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Part of the West End Festival

By My Hands, Departures, Chasm, Dana Walker Paridian, The Colour Pink Is Gay

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

rock pop indie

CG Music presents: The Mickey 9’s, The Covergirls

Gothenburg Address, Tempercalm, The Colin Hunter Band, What The Blood Revealed

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, £5

Post-rock

Classical, opera-ish leanings

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Thu 25 Jun

Zouk Zouk McGook

West End Festival: Auricle Ensemble

Òran Mór, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

the Latecomers

Lauries Bar, 20:15–23:00, Free

Burial Hex, Altercado, Uncalm 13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

Classical horror

Breakdown Bands vs DJS (The Vandalays, The Aftereffects, Terry Pussypower) Soundhaus, 20:30–03:30, £6 (£5)

The Breakdown Bands night consists mainly but not exclusively of Indie, Rock and Electronic Acts as well as anything unusual.

Sun 28 Jun Rumble in the jumble

13th Note, 12:30–23:30, Free before 7:30pm, £4 after

Flea market during the day, morphing into an evening of live performances and DJ sets

Rudy Alba

Brel, 16:00–19:00, £tbc

Reggae

West End Festival: Soul Sunday with The Five Aces, The Bottleneckers, The Privates Òran Mór, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Soul and jazz

Malcolm Middleton

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £12.50

Solo stuff from the Arab Strap man

Das Filth

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £tbc

Post-punk graffiti appropriators

LENNY KRAVITZ

Experimental acoustic Glasgowbased outfit

Woodenbox With a Fistful of Fivers

The LLR 20(09) tour, paying homage to his classic debut album

Bucky rage

Alt. folk

o2 Academy, 19:00–23:00, £29.50

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Next Stop Rehab presents: The Murderburgers, Heller State, Burnout 27, The Cellophanes

Garage disco for cowboys

Scottish pop punk

Brel, 15:00–18:00, Free

Sat 27 Jun

The Twisted Wheel, 19:00–23:00, £4

Derek Fairlie Quartet

Cassidy, Mitchell Museum

Jazz funk

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

A.k.a Barry Adrian Reese

St Deluxe

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Concrete Campfire

Indie guitar shot through with glorious nintendo soundbites

Acoustic session

Ivory Blacks, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Brel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Mr. Fog

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Alternative rock

Three bands of common influence/ genre take you on a weekly romp

The Verdict

60 THE SKINNY June 2009

Local talent showcase

Dirty goth punk

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4

codes in the clouds

Òran Mór, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Shut Up and Eat Your Music

Local talent showcase

Alternative rock

TWS presents: The Black Lights

Jackie Onassis, Streets of Rage

Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Ska and funk

Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

The Tenants, Val Verde, RBRBR

Indie rock ‘n’ rollers

King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, 20:00–00:00, £8

Hire : Bands tbc

TWS presents: Breaching Copyright

Indie rock

The Amphetameanies, Big Hand

Mon 22 Jun

Throw rocks against your ear drums. Weekly.

MAX RAPTOR

o2 Academy, 19:00–23:00, £6

Pop punk

Ali Campbell

Saxophone led

Metal rock

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £4/5

West End Festival: De Rosa

Indie Pop Rock

Healthy Minds Collapse, Geometrics

Ivory Blacks, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Wreckin pit : murderburgers launch

ABC, 19:00–23:00, £5

Stewart Forbes Quartet Panasia, Siphon Plane, Annihilation, Painfish

The Flying Duck, 20:00–00:00, Free

Tue 23 Jun

Giraffes, monkeys and stories set to beats

Brel, 15:00–00:00, Free

The Slow Club (Smackvan)

Weekly indie.

Out of the Swim, Ten Tonne Wasp, John Deery, Steph MacLeod

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

The Last Saloon

Firewater, 20:00–23:00, Free

Weekly showcase

West End Festival: Academia Salsa

FLARES

70s tribute

Jeye T: EP Launch Box, 20:00–23:00, Free

Experimental Indie

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Jocasta Sleeps

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Rock

No Tribe (First Step to Failure, Despondent, Vantage Point, Croma) Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £3

Throw rocks against your ear drums. Weekly.

TWS presents: Trapped in Kansas, We Hung your Leader, The Darien Venture, City of Statues

The Twisted Wheel, 20:00–23:00, Free

Local talent showcase

Mon 29 Jun

Local Tour Guide, Lifestreambroadcast

JOHN MAYALL

The V Club, 20:00–23:00, £5

o2 Academy, 19:00–23:00, £20

Indie rock

Blues singer songwriter

Orko

The Boycotts, The King Hats

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Indie rock

The Twist, Hugo A Go Go, Storm Society

Captain’s Rest, 20:00–22:30, £tbc

Alt. indie and ska

Quite intelligent rhythms

Maggie Mays, 20:00–23:00, £5

A-lix, Dead Boy Robotics, Digital Dinosaurs

Under the Paving Stones

Acoustic Bazooka (Liam Porch, Holly Ogilvie, Neil McClafferty, Larry Guild)

Monthly pop punk and new wave

Weekly acoustic night.

Òran Mór, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

13th Note, 20:30–23:30, £3/4

Boys and girls with machines

Metal and rock

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5

Pivo Pivo, 20:00–23:00, £5/1

Edinburgh music Tue 02 Jun THE PANICS

Cabaret Voltaire, 19:30–22:30, £tbc

Alt. rock

Music Routes Festival: The Jamie Smith Band The Village, 19:30–23:00, £6

Young Traditional Musician of the Year, 2002

White Noise (Saint Jude’s Infirmary, White Heath)

The Electric Circus, 20:00–03:00, £4/ Free after 11pm

A weekly array of up and coming Scottish acts, followed up by DJ sets from Tanya Mellotte and Gavin Glove

Wed 03 Jun Graeme Stephen Trio

Great Grog, 19:00–22:00, Free

Weekly jazz

Mayhew, I Hear Echoes, Helen Currie, Matt Dunn The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

Alternative classic rock

THE OK SOCIAL CLUB, THE 10:04’s

Cabaret Voltaire, 19:30–22:30, £tbc

Indie post punk

Corner Sessions (Windlestray) The Lot, 20:00–22:30, £4

Third Wednesday of every month. More info at: www.myspace.com/cornersessions

SJ Esau

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–23:00, £6/5

Electronic folk

SINISTER FLYNN

Bannerman’s, 21:00–23:00, £4

Funk and ska

Thu 04 Jun NORTHWESTERN, THE REMNANT KINGS, DELTA MAINLINE Sneaky Pete’s, 19:00–22:00, £5

Indie and roughed up alt. pop prowess

The Dyad

Wee Red Bar, 19:00–22:00, £5

Alt. americana

DUTY FREE: CRYOVERBILLIONAIRES, OVER THE WALL, THE VOID, LIONS.CHASE.TIGER Cabaret Voltaire, 19:00–22:30, Free

Good good good stuff

Terry Callier

Queen’s Hall, 19:00–22:30, £15

Soul legend

grace.will.fall, Issues of Morality, Shields Up!

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–23:00, £4

Swedish hardcore

Limbo

The Voodoo Rooms, 20:00–00:00, £5

Voodoo’s weekly forray into the burgeoning music scene

MARVEL HEIGHTS, JANE STREET DIVERSION Bannerman’s, 21:00–23:00, £4

Alt. rock and power pop

MY LATEST NOVEL, COPY HAHO, MITCHELL MUSEUM

Concert Band 21st Celebration Concert

The last ever Black Tape night

Birthday concert of film and band classics, conducted by Sarah Cunningham

Sneaky Pete’s, 19:00–22:00, £6.50

THE RAW KINGS, THE MERCHANTS

Cabaret Voltaire, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Rock zouk

FUTURE OF THE LEFT

Studio 24, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Alt. rock

Irn Madein, Adrenalyn, Hippocampus The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

Metal classic rock

De La Soul

Queen’s Hall, 19:30–22:00, £10

Nobody Else

Wee Red Bar, 19:30–22:00, £5

Alt. rock

SENEKA

Cabaret Voltaire, 19:30–22:30, £5

Rock

gasgiant, Gong Fei, Okker, Fighterplanes

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 19:30–23:00, £5/4

Punk

Hip hop

THE PLIGHT, THE TYRANT LIZARD KINGS

The Seven Deadly Sins, The Nature Boys

Rock

The Picture House, 19:30–23:00, £17

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–23:00, £5/4

Indie rock

Be a Familiar, Playtone, Richard Cobb

Maggie’s Chamber, 21:30–00:00, Free

SoCo social pre-party to Rockness

Penny Black Remedy, The Red Well

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5/4

Balkan country punk

Black Tape (Mitchell Museum, Copy Haho, My Latest Novel)

Sneaky Pete’s, 23:00–03:00, Free

Indie electro

Sat 06 Jun Meadows Festival 2009: The Forest Stage (The Tuberians, Hailey Beavis, Billy Liar, The Byrons, Ruby and The Emeralds, Meursault, William Douglas and the Wheel, The Black Diamond Express, Darkness ) The Meadows, 12:00–19:00, £tbc

The Forest Stage, in association with The Police Box and Ten Tracks, present two full days of summery musical delight featuring some of Edinburgh’s finest.

THE RAB HOWAT BAND

Bannerman’s, 16:00–18:00, Free

Rock

The Damned, The Alarm, Henry Cluney

The Picture House, 18:30–23:00, £17.50

Punk

el bassar (Found, Withered Hand, My Kappa Roots, Rob St John, Wounded Knee, Little Pebble) Old St Paul’s Scottish Episcopal Church, 19:00–00:00, £10/8

Fundraising gig in aid of a landscaping/ art project taking place in Al-Shurooq School for Blind Children, Palestine

Colossal Indie Birthday Party (Svengali, The Vibe, The Remnant Kings, Kung Fu) The Voodoo Rooms, 19:00–01:00, £5

Indie toddlers

Epic 26

Bannerman’s, 21:00–23:00, £4

Saturday Night Fish Fry (Erik D’Viking)

The Jazz Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3), £3 b4 11.30pm

Sun 07 Jun Meadows Festival 2009: The Forest Stage (Chandra & The Forest Chior, White Heath, Jesus H. Foxx, FoxGang, Punch and the Apostles) The Meadows, 12:00–19:00, £tbc

The Forest Stage, in association with The Police Box and Ten Tracks, present two full days of summery musical delight featuring some of Edinburgh’s finest.

WE HEART TAPES (Epic 26)

The Electric Circus, 16:00–19:00, £6

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

Soul Survivor: Missing Cat, The Offenders, James Brown is Annie, The Ubiquitous Kings of Rhythm with James Carr

The Voodoo Rooms, 18:30–22:00, £5

Soul

POST WAR YEARS

Cabaret Voltaire, 19:00–22:30, £tbc

Rock

Howard Eliott Payne (Charlene Soria, Jennifer Concannon) The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

Britbus (The Debuts, The Strands, Beatnic Prestige, These Are the Days, Our Lunar Activities) The Bongo Club, 19:30–00:00, £4

Julia Jones and her globetrotting double decker bus

MILLER PRESENTS: HOSEMOX, APERTURE Bannerman’s, 21:00–23:00, £4

Alt. punk

Tue 09 Jun DF CONCERTS PRESENT : PEARL AND THE PUPPETS

Sneaky Pete’s, 19:00–22:00, £tbc

Single launch party for Beautiful World

Barberos, Mr Peppermint, The Fatalists

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 19:30–23:00, £tbc

A triple drum/ synth stand-off

ACOUSTIC SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT (We See Lights, Randan Discotheque)

The Electric Circus, 20:00–23:00, Free

Bainbridge presents (TBC)

Nothing Concrete (Inspired)

CRANACHAN

Indie medley

Folk blues acoustic

Celtic

Bannerman’s, 20:00–23:00, £4

Thu 11 Jun

The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

Ish Marquez

The Bowery, 20:00–22:00, £tbc

Indie soul-rock from Texas

O.P.E.N, Secta Rouge, Jackie Treehorn

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–23:00, £4

Sneaky Pete’s, 19:00–22:00, £tbc

Old St Paul’s Scottish Episcopal Church, 19:00–03:00, £7/ Weekend tickets £15

The 2nd annual DIY festival of experimental music

Graeme Stephen Trio

Great Grog, 19:00–22:00, Free

Weekly jazz

SAM ISAAC

Sneaky Pete’s, 19:00–22:00, £6

Showcasing the debut album, Bears

The Cosmonauts, Paul Gladwell, Susanna MacDonald

The Mill Edinburgh @ Cabaret Voltaire, 19:30–22:30, Free

Showcase double-bills for the best upand-coming acts. For more information on these gigs go to: themill-live.com

The Wee Baby Jesuses, Johnny and the Entries, Gummi Bako

Universal You

The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

Pop rock

Trampoline presents: Meursault, Wounded Knee, The Foundling Wheel A sterling line-up of Skinny favourites

Henry’s Independence Party Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–03:00, £4

Line-up yet to announced

The Voodoo Rooms, 20:00–01:00, Free

Cutting-edge international and UK electronic music and video artists perform live in the venue and into the venue via the net

Diane Cluck

The Bowery, 20:00–22:00, £tbc

Singer songwriter

Limbo

BALKANARAMA (Erdogan Orkestra, Kuchke, Mrs DJ Grandma Staflaš, Black Cat)

Voodoo’s weekly forray into the burgeoning music scene

Balkan, gypsy, klezmer and East European music.

HMV Picture House, 21:00–03:00, £9, £7 b4 10.30pm

The Voodoo Rooms, 20:00–00:00, £5

Saturday Night Fish Fry (Erik D’Viking)

Fri 12 Jun

The Jazz Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3), £3 b4 11.30pm

The Lot, 19:00–22:30, £10/8

Sun 14 Jun

Indie pop

WE HEART TAPES (Dead Boy Robotics)

Dead Good Villans, Skellum, The 14th Goat from the Left, Auxerre, Sun Sons

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

Cabaret Voltaire, 19:00–22:30, £5

The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

Indie punk rock

Neoviolet, Mayhew, Lindsay Sugden & The Storm T The Tron, 19:30–22:00, £4/3

Debut for Nick Carder’s new band (we hear there’ll be cakes)

Edinburgh Napier University Showcase

Queen’s Hall, 19:48–21:00, £tbc

Performances from graduating students of the Ian Tomlin School of Music

Sad Society

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–23:00, £5/4

Alt. cabaret from Itsy

Rock and funk to make you ...

The Bongo Club, 19:00–21:30, £10/8

Afro beats

Sol, Storm In A D Cup, The Merchants, Pose Victorious, Black Sea Sailors ACOUSTIC SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT (Richard Cobb, John MacIntosh )

A drumming, singing, electric violining forray into Edinburgh’s post-punk, anti-folk heart

Kabarett

I Dream of Fela (Ethel Cee, Sway, Baby J, Richard Olatunde Baker)

Indie rock

Wee Red Bar, 19:30–22:00, £10

A Jokers Rage, Storm in a D-Cup

The Electric Circus, 16:00–19:00, £6

The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

The Summer Revel (Randan Discotheque, Come On Gang, Y’all Is Fantasy Island )

Punk

The Voodoo Rooms, 20:00–23:00, £2

Queen’s Hall, 19:00–22:30, £15.50

Wee Red Bar, 19:30–22:00, £5

Part of the Leith festival

The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

Acoustic rock

Celtic quintet

Singer songwriter, promoting her eighth album - Coming Up For Air

THE SHERMANS, THE HOT LIPS, THE LEADS

MACH NAUSEA 2009 (A Band, Atomized, Defibrillators, Neil Davidson and Helheseten trio, Team Bric, Wounded Knee, Hockyfrilla, Cities Prepare for Attack!)

The Bongo Club, 19:00–22:00, £10

Live at The Mill (Luva Anna, Dirty Modern Hero)

White Noise (Withered Hand (EP Launch), Benni Hemm Hemm, Ish Marquez, Emily Scott, Sebastian Fors)

Wed 10 Jun

Voyage de Nuit

Randan presents: Horse and Band

African Melodies

A weekly array of up and coming Scottish acts, followed up by DJ sets from Tanya Mellotte and Gavin Glove

A festival of live, avant garde electronica

Recently signed to King Tut’s Recordings

Indie and alt. rock

The Electric Circus, 20:00–03:00, £4/ Free after 11pm

Leith Cricket Club, 18:00–03:00, £5

WOODENBOX WITH A FISTFUL OF FIVERS, THE KAYS LAVELLE, KRISTOFFER MORGAN

Laptop Lounge

Loud, danceable Scottish indie pop

Autobahn Prog 01 (Action Group, The Monosynth Orchestra)

Punk rock

WE WERE PROMISED JETPACKS

Alternative indie rock

The Voodoo Rooms, 19:30–22:00, £5

Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–23:00, £4

The Village, 19:30–23:00, £5

Cabaret Voltaire, 19:00–22:30, £6

Sat 13 Jun

Mason Summers

The PR’s dream, recently signed to Universal. Convinced?

The Gypsy Soul Experience, Jake Cogan

EP launch

The Ark, 19:00–23:00, £4

London folk from the Mumford/Marling school of thought

The City Ignites

Acoustic sets, with pull-out folk features and the occasional witty jazz column

Wee Red Bar, 19:00–22:00, £4

Sneaky Pete’s, 19:00–22:00, £5

Blues folk

The Electric Circus, 19:00–22:00, £tbc

Fri 05 Jun

Mon 08 Jun CHERBOURG, THE AGITATOR , JONNY DEACON, DAN LOWE

The Electric Circus, 20:00–23:00, Free

Acoustic sets, with pull-out folk features and the occasional witty jazz column

Rodent Emporium, Tabasco Fiasco, Bo Deadly, The Dirty Toilet Humour Society Henry’s Cellar Bar, 20:00–23:00, £4

New wave rock and punk

Mon 15 Jun Naturally 7

Queen’s Hall, 20:00–22:30, £18.50

Gospel, soul and R&B

Maggie’s Chamber, 21:30–00:00, Free

THE MONICANS, ZENER DIODE Bannerman’s, 21:00–23:00, £4

Alt. rock

June 2009

THE SKINNY 61

EDINBURGH MUSIC TUE 16 JUN JACK PENATE

BREAKING BOUNDARIES IN MUSIC

THE BONGO CLUB, 19:00–22:00, £11

36 BLAIR ST, EDINBURGH. 0131 220 6176

THE THERMALS, PAVILION

DUTY FREE

Following the release of their fourth album, Now We Can See

7pm - 10pm free entry!!

4th June

cryoverbillionaires, over the wall, the void, lions.chase.tigers 22nd June one eskimo, plus special guests 28th June lost knives NO TICKETS REQUIRED myspace.com/dutyfree2009

London-based indie soul-pop pup SNEAKY PETE’S, 19:00–22:00, £TBC

Emily Scott & guests

2nd June 09 7pm

A weekly array of up and coming Scottish acts, followed up by DJ sets from Tanya Mellotte and Gavin Glove

WED 17 JUN GRAEME STEPHEN TRIO

GREAT GROG, 19:00–22:00, FREE

Weekly jazz

PROCEED, MIND SET A THREAT STUDIO 24, 19:00–23:00, £TBC

Prog. rock

TUKOO, PAUL WISHART

BANNERMAN’S, 21:00–23:00, £4

Rock

THU 18 JUN

126 RECORDS AND EVENTS PRESENT: POISON TEACUPS, DOC.DANEEKA

STUDIO 24, 19:00–23:00, £TBC

myspace.com/ thempostwaryears

supported by: over 14s 7PM

HOMEwork 23rd June UNICORN KID& GUESTS

RIPPING RECORDS (SOUTH BRIDGE), WWW.TICKETWEB.CO.UK T: 08444 77 1000 TICKETS SCOTLAND T: 0131 220 3234

WWW.THECABARETVOLTAIRE.COM

62 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

HENRY’S CELLAR BAR, 23:00–03:00, £4

Part of the ‘I Am A Mess’ club night

SATURDAY NIGHT FISH FRY (BELLERUCHE (TRU THOUGHTS)) THE JAZZ BAR, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3), £3 B4 11.30PM

SUN 21 JUN WE HEART TAPES (DIRTY SUMMER)

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 16:00–19:00, £6

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

UNGDOMSKULEN, THE GOTHENBURG ADDRESS, WON MISSISSIPPI

SNEAKY PETE’S, 19:00–22:00, £TBC

Norweigen rock power trio

ACOUSTIC SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT (CHUTES, CARRIE MACDONALD)

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 20:00–23:00, FREE

Acoustic sets, with pull-out folk features and the occasional witty jazz column

MON 22 JUN

THE BIG FREAK - SEA SHANTII’S & GAY PIRATES

MEDINA, 22:00–03:00, £2-4 (FANCY DRESS ENCOURAGED)

A melange of live swash buckling art, dance and music featuring Ruby & the Emeralds and The Banana Sessions

NDAJE

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £8/5

Afrobeats, ska and celtic crossovers

FRI 26 JUN YUILL SCOTT & THE HAIGHT

THE BONGO CLUB, 19:00–22:00, £TBC

Rock ‘n’ roll

SERPICO

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:00–22:30, £TBC

Punk rock

VANTAGE POINT (SHOTTEN ROCK, HOUNDS OF AUDIO PRIME, WHITE TRASH CIRCUS) THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

Rock metal punk

4DAYWEEKEND

BANNERMAN’S, 21:00–23:00, £4

indie rock

Fairytale narratives told by a midget in a hoodie

MAGGIE’S CHAMBER, 21:30–00:00, FREE

BLACK PRESIDENT

DIRTY KNIFE, BATTLE A DINOSAUR

THE VOODOO ROOMS, 19:00–01:00, £5 ENTRY, £5 TOURNAMENT

Registration ends 7.30pm sharp.

JAZZ INTERNATIONAL PRESENTS: THE BRIAN KELLOCK TRIO THE LOT, 20:00–22:30, £12/10

Jazz classics and standards

LE SINGE BLANC

HENRY’S CELLAR BAR, 20:00–23:00, £5

Punky funkcore

LIMBO

THE VOODOO ROOMS, 20:00–00:00, £5

Voodoo’s weekly forray into the burgeoning music scene

Yanky punks

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:30–22:30, FREE

BANNERMAN’S, 21:00–23:00, £4

Punk

TUE 23 JUN UNICORN KID

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:00–22:30, £4

Electro pop and happy hardcore

WHITE NOISE (COME ON GANG! VENDOR DEFENDER)

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 20:00–03:00, £4/ FREE AFTER 11PM

A weekly array of up and coming Scottish acts, followed up by DJ sets from Tanya Mellotte and Gavin Glove

WED 24 JUN

ATHLETE, IAN ARCHER Indie four-piece

THE BEAT

A DAY OVERDUE

Ska and reggae

Pop punk

THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

YROCK PRESENT:

PONY PACK, JACKIE TREEHORN

Bands to be confirmed

Punky pop showtunes

LORDS OF BASTARD, DEADOTTER, JACKAL-HEADED GUARD OF THE DEAD BANNERMAN’S, 21:00–23:00, £4

STUDIO 24, 19:00–23:00, £TBC

SEA BASS KID

WEE RED BAR, 19:30–22:00, £4/5

Indie blues

Psychedelic rock

ACOUSTIC LADYLAND

THE FIRE AND I, LITTLE DOSES, FURIOUS

Fresh four-piece, touring Living With A Tiger

THE VOODOO ROOMS, 20:00–23:00, £8

Tumbling electro powerpop duo

ALL TOMORROW’S PARTIES

COYOTE MEN, THE BRUTES, ACID FASCISTS

ATLUM SCHEMA

CONFUSION IS SEX

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £5

Where David Lynch fantasy becomes reality.

AQUALUNG (AQUALUNG)

REID CONCERT HALL, 00:00–23:01

SAT 20 JUN TAKING CHASE, OVERTHROW, MATTHEW REYNOLDS

HENRY’S CELLAR BAR, 19:00–22:00, £TBC

Melodramatic pop

Hardcore

CLUB FOR HEROES (HOUSE OF TRAPS)

WEE RED BAR, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4)

Psychedelic disco music from beyond the stars.

SAT 27 JUN JUST TOURIST

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:00–22:30, £TBC

Indie rock

METALHEAD WEEKEND: AGGRESSUS VEGAS!

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:00–22:30, £15.50

THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

HENRY’S CELLAR BAR, 23:00–03:00, £4

Weekly jazz

First Edinburgh gig for the Teesside rock ensemble THE PICTURE HOUSE, 19:00–23:00, £14

Electro, reverbs, you clever people

THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

GREAT GROG, 19:00–22:00, FREE

SNEAKY PETE’S, 19:00–22:00, £TBC

RBRBR

GRAEME STEPHEN TRIO

TELEVISED CRIMEWAVE, CHATEAU GREYSKULL, THE PLANES

Garage rock

WWW.SUGARBEATCLUB.COM

PAUL VICKERS AND THE LEG

RUB-A-DUB STYLE

THE ULTIMATE GUITAR HERO FUNDRAISER #2

HENRY’S CELLAR BAR, 23:00–03:00, £5

BRODINSKI vs. SURKIN

THE LOT, 19:30–22:30, £TBC

THE VOODOO ROOMS, 20:00–00:00, £5

Pop

MAGGIE’S CHAMBER, 21:30–00:00, FREE

26th JUNE 10.30pm - 3am

Rock pop funk

DUTY FREE: ONE ESKIMO

HENRY’S CELLAR BAR, 19:00–22:00, £5

7th June 09

Hosted by Lorna Brooks and The Sapphie Music Club

CITY CAFÉ, 21:00–01:00, FREE

SURRENDER, THE FUCK-UPS

POST WAR YEARS

THE GUILTY LILY, 20:00–22:30, £TBC

Album launch gig

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 20:00–03:00, £4/ FREE AFTER 11PM

FRI 19 JUN

myspace.com/thepanicsmusic

THE PLANES, MISSING CAT, MYSHKIN

WHITE NOISE (LE RENO AMPS)

JAMIE T

support:

Rock

MARTIN STEPHENSON, HELEN MCCOOKERYBOOK

Voodoo’s weekly forray into the burgeoning music scene

Post punk and alt. indie

Monday 1st June

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:00–22:30, £6

Sludge

Metal pop punk

THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

Teitur

THE TRADE

HENRY’S CELLAR BAR, 19:30–23:00, £6

STITCH RECORDS PRESENTS: THE ZACK A MOIR COLLECTIVE

THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

Tour de Frank

FREE ENTRY 7PM FREE ENTRY 7PM

Former Byrds frontman

THOU, MOLOCH, HAAR

LIMBO

THE PICTURE HOUSE, 19:00–22:00, £24.50

11th June : Luva Anna, Dirty Modern Hero 25th June : Rosco, special guests

QUEEN’S HALL, 19:00–22:30, £24.50

THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

THE REDSHIFT, A LOST GENERATION, ANGELA JACKMAN, REBELS OUT

ZAPPA PLAYS ZAPPA

themill-live.com

CMP ENTERTAINMENT PRESENTS: ROGER MCGUINN

THE PICTURE HOUSE, 20:00–23:00, £18.50 BANNERMAN’S, 21:00–23:00, £4

Alt. rock

THU 25 JUN 126 RECORDS AND EVENTS PRESENT: ROLLED UP 20’S THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £4

Alt. indie

LIVE AT THE MILL (THE GILLYFLOWERS, COLIN TRAIN)

THE MILL EDINBURGH @ CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:30–22:30, FREE

Showcase double-bills for the best upand-coming acts. For more information on these gigs go to: themill-live.com

Thrash metal

THE VOODOO ROOMS, 20:30–01:00, £5

Hosted by Frankie Sumatra, Bugsy Seagull, Dino Martini and Sam Jose

SATURDAY NIGHT FISH FRY

THE JAZZ BAR, 23:30–03:00, £5/3 (BEFORE 11PM)

SUN 28 JUN GBH PRESENTS: LIPID, PITIFUL REIGN, RIVER FRESHNEY, VISCERAL ATTACK, LIFELESS, AGRESSSUS, CIRCLE OF TYRANTS, NECROPOLIS THE GRV, 15:00–23:00, £5

Thrash metal

WE HEART TAPES (FANGS)

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 16:00–19:00, £6

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

DUTY FREE: LOST KNIVES

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 19:00–22:30, FREE

Manchester-based up ‘n’ comers

MAEVE O’BOYLE

THE ARK, 19:00–23:00, £2

ACOUSTIC SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT (AMY DUNCAN, MARTIN JAMES, AL SHIELDS & THE WILTED ROSES)

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 20:00–23:00, FREE

Acoustic sets, with pull-out folk features and the occasional witty jazz column

Glasgow Clubs Tue 02 Jun All The Young Nudes

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Killer Kitsch

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Wed 03 Jun

New Skool (Nick Peacock, John Ross and Alex O) The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6

Slabs Of The Tabernacle (English Electric, inserted, Andrew Ingram, Brian d’Souza)

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £6

Octopussy

The Arches, 22:30–03:00, £7 (£5)

Watchamacallit (Dj Bobby Bluebell)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Punk Flavor Funk. Caramel. Milk Psychoclate.

Disco, italo, techno, electro.

SOLUTe (Mr Henry Von) The Club (69), 23:00–03:00, £5

House & techno.

Subculture

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £8

Weekly snapshot of the ever-evolving house blueprint.

Thu 04 Jun EQd Residents Night (Bobby Wilson, Truman Data & Alex Ash) The V Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Groove based electronic

45 Kicks (John Ross and Alex O)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Alternative Nation (Barry and Harvey Kartel) Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

Rock, industrial, metal, punk and electro

Off The Record and Animal Farm (DJ Pete)

Soundhaus, 23:00–04:00, £10 (£8)

House, techno.

Bleep (Plaid)

Pivo Pivo, 23:59–05:00, £12 (£10)

Live techno & electro.

Sun 07 Jun Junk (Marky Mark)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Mixed Bizness

Glasgow School of Art (Vic Gallery), 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Hip hop, house, drum & bass, funk, dance hall, electro, garage, break beat and disco.

Eight Pounds of Pressure Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, £2

Thomson vs Thomson vs Thompson. Dub, Techno, Jungle, Bass, Loud.

Optimo (JD Twitch and JG Wilkes)

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £7 (£6)

Diverse music policy.

Ritual (DJ Barry)

Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

Rock, Metal, Punk and Industrial tunes.

Mon 08 Jun

Fri 05 Jun Countach June (Dave Shades, inserted, Slabs of the Tabernacle DJs) The Halt Bar, 20:00–00:00, Free

Italo, space, electro, soundtracks.

Sound Museum (DJ Hushpuppy (Art School) & Chris Geddes (Belle & Sebastian)) Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

Bullet:dodge (Loweck)

The Flying Duck, 22:00–03:00, £3.50 (£2.50)

Techno, electro, house.

Damnation (DJ Barry & Dec) Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

Eyes Wide Open (Thomas)

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4)

Garage, psych, freakbeat, rock n roll.

Minimize (L’il Miss Mix It, Gaiden and Minimalism) Ad Lib, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4)

Minimal to techno.

Burn (DJs Normski, Zeus & Mash)

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £10

Techno & electro.

Old Skool

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6

The Basement (2Manky DJ’s, Evilean, Dirty Hospital, Elliot Castro) Soundhaus, 23:00–04:00, £7 (£5)

Techno, electro & house.

Damaged Goods (David Barborossa)

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, £3

Punk, noise, pop, disco, funk, rock n roll.

Sat 06 Jun The Hip Drop (Robbie Rolex) Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

Reggae, funk and tekfunk.

Pandemic

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 21:00–03:00, £3, free b4 11.30pm

Indie, 60’s garage, soul, rock n roll.

Absolution (DJ Barry and DJ Dec)

Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

A heavy alternative concoction involving styles from metal to emo, punk to industrial. Drinks offers all night to keep you absolved.

Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

BALKANARAMA (Erdogan Orkestra, Kuchke, Mrs DJ Grandma Staflaš, Black Cat)

The Arches, 21:00–03:00, £9, £7 b4 10.30pm

Balkan, gypsy, klezmer and East European music.

Damnation (DJ Barry & Dec) Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

Ballers Social Club (Cooly G (HyperDub) Bok Bok + Jackmaster b2b (Night Slugs / Numbers), LuckyMe DJ’s) Stereo, 23:00–03:00, £7 (£5)

Techno, electronica, hip hop.

Old Skool

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6

Project 1 vs Ignite Black (Rob Da Rhythm, Stu Laurie, DJ Livie, Mark Anderson and Allan Orr) Soundhaus, 23:00–04:00, £8 (£6)

Hardcore, hardstyle, gabba, techtrance and hardtrance.

Kino Fist (Charlotte)

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, £3

New Wave, Krautrock, Spiky pop & Freakbeat, with visuals.

Sat 13 Jun Pirate Music presents the Trade CD Launch with Indie DJ Collective (The Trade, Satellite Underground, Would be Kings and TV Revo) Soundhaus, 19:30–02:30, £7 (£6)

Ritual (DJ Barry)

Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

Rock, Metal, Punk and Industrial tunes.

Mon 15 Jun Burn (DJs Normski, Zeus & Mash)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

Tue 16 Jun All The Young Nudes

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Killer Kitsch

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Wed 17 Jun

New Skool (Nick Peacock, John Ross and Alex O) The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6

Sound Museum (DJ Hushpuppy (Art School) & Chris Geddes (Belle & Sebastian))

Subculture

Black Tent

Weekly snapshot of the ever-evolving house blueprint.

Klutch ‘n’ Breaks (Ixi of Audiotrix alongside residents Scott Confusion and Terry Pussypower. Also featuring Jo D’Arc, Jnr Lazarus (FROOT) & The Sonic Consortium) Soundhaus, 23:00–04:00, £10 (£8)

Octopussy

Bottle Rocket

The Arches, 22:30–03:00, £7 (£5)

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, £3

Watchamacallit (Dj Bobby Bluebell)

A night for dancing to indie-pop, postpunk, motown, twee and anything else that gets feet tapping.

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Punk Flavor Funk. Caramel. Milk Psychoclate.

Thu 18 Jun

Sun 21 Jun The Slow Club (Smackvan)

EQd Residents Night (Bobby Wilson, Truman Data & Alex Ash)

The Flying Duck, 20:00–00:00, Free

Groove based electronic

Optimo (MODERNAIRE)

45 Kicks (John Ross and Alex O)

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £9 (£8)

The V Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Alternative Nation (Barry and Harvey Kartel) Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

Rock, industrial, metal, punk and electro

Juice Box (JOKERS OF THE SCENE)

Rock, Metal, Punk and Industrial tunes.

Burn (DJs Normski, Zeus & Mash)

60’s Ska and Soul, Jamaica’s Studio One meets Detroit and Chicago Motown sounds. We also bring cake.

The Arches, 22:30–03:00, £7 (£5)

A French Samba-Reggae band performing on stage with local bateria SambaYaBamba and east coast rivals Edinburgh Samba School in the West End Festival’s annual pre parade party.

Watchamacallit (Dj Bobby Bluebell)

Absolution (DJ Barry and DJ Dec)

Punk Flavor Funk. Caramel. Milk Psychoclate.

A heavy alternative concoction involving styles from metal to emo, punk to industrial. Drinks offers all night to keep you absolved.

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Wed 10 Jun Octopussy

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

QueerBash (No-Bra, Noisy Pig and Scragfight) The Flying Duck, 21:00–03:00, £5

Resident DJs playing a mix of alternative, punk, post-punk, shoegaze, drone, electro-pop & queercore.

EQd Present: PETER VAN HOESEN

The V Club, 23:00–03:00, £5/6

Of Time to Express

45 Kicks (John Ross and Alex O)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Alternative Nation (Barry and Harvey Kartel) Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

Rock, industrial, metal, punk and electro

Mixed Bizness Glasgow School of Art (Vic Gallery), 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Hip hop, house, drum & bass, funk, dance hall, electro, garage, break beat and disco.

Go Wonder!

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, Free

Indie, Pop, Punk, Funk, Rock, Dreampop and Garage classics.

QMU, 21:00–02:00, £9

Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

New Skool (Nick Peacock, John Ross and Alex O) The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6

Subculture

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £8

Weekly snapshot of the ever-evolving house blueprint.

Whitenoisefeedback: distortion presents… Muck (Craig McGee and Paul McQueen)

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

ELECTRO, POP, MASHUPS.

Kitchen Sessions (Michael Paterson (Colors/Teknika/ Punchfunk/7Elements), Clouston (Teknika/Specialitee/Tao), Pete Goddfrey (Respect the Dancefloor))

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £3, free with flyer

Fri 19 Jun Sound Museum (DJ Hushpuppy (Art School) & Chris Geddes (Belle & Sebastian)) Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

Damnation (DJ Barry & Dec) Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

Rectify (Will Atkinson)

Soundhaus, 22:30–04:00, £10 (£8)

House & techno.

Jukebox!

The Hot Club

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 21:00–03:00, £3, free b4 11.30pm

Garage, punk, psych.

Absolution (DJ Barry and DJ Dec)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

A heavy alternative concoction involving styles from metal to emo, punk to industrial. Drinks offers all night to keep you absolved.

Wed 24 Jun

Baltimore, funk, techno, hip-hop, old fashioned party tunes.

Dance! Dance! Dance! (Andy Piacentini, Derek Smith, DJ Ferrero and Captain BK McVey)

The Arches, 22:30–03:00, £7 (£5)

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £5

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Inside Out (Lady Dana, DJ Isaac, John O’Callaghan, Blutonium Boy, Simon Patterson, Alpha2, Sied Van Riel, DJ Preach plus CO2 cannons, UV Guns and White Lasers)

Punk Flavor Funk. Caramel. Milk Psychoclate.

Thu 25 Jun EQd Present: DJ FAD

The Arches, 23:00–03:00, £tbc

The V Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

New Skool (Nick Peacock, John Ross and Alex O)

Techno

45 Kicks (John Ross and Alex O)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6

spectrum

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Old Skool

Alternative Nation (Barry and Harvey Kartel)

Upside Down

Rock, industrial, metal, punk and electro

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £5 The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6 Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, £3

Rock n roll, punk, garage.

Sat 20 Jun

Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

Mixed Bizness Glasgow School of Art (Vic Gallery), 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Techno, tech-house.

The Hip Drop (Robbie Rolex)

Wrong Island (Dirty Larry & Teamy)

Reggae, funk and tekfunk.

Wigs

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, £3

Techno, beats, electronica.

Sun 14 Jun Junk (Marky Mark)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Optimo (CASIOKIDS)

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £10 (£9)

Diverse music policy.

Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

Shapes (MR COPY (Soma))

Basura Blanca, 21:00–02:00, £6 (£5)

Techno, Electro and Tech House.

Absolution (DJ Barry and DJ Dec)

Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

A heavy alternative concoction involving styles from metal to emo, punk to industrial. Drinks offers all night to keep you absolved.

Blackfriars Basement, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

Electro, Fidget, House and Techno.

Subculture

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £8

Weekly snapshot of the ever-evolving house blueprint.

Sun 28 Jun

Hip hop, house, drum & bass, funk, dance hall, electro, garage, break beat and disco.

Soundhaus, 23:00–04:00, £7 (£5)

Soundhaus, 20:30–03:30, £6 (£5)

Reggae, funk and tekfunk.

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Watchamacallit (Dj Bobby Bluebell)

Breakdown Bands vs DJS (The Vandalays, The Aftereffects, Terry Pussypower)

Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

Tue 23 Jun

Octopussy

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, £3 (£2 student)

Old Skool

The Hip Drop (Robbie Rolex)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

Cheap ‘n’ Nasty

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £10

The Breakdown Bands night consists mainly but not exclusively of Indie, Rock and Electronic Acts as well as anything unusual.

Mon 22 Jun

Killer Kitsch

How’s Your Party? (Boy 8 Bit (Mad Decent), Xxxchange (Spank Rock), A La Fu (Radio Skool / Va Va))

Sat 27 Jun

Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

The Soul Skattitude

Reggae, funk and tekfunk.

Jeckyll on Hydepark Street brings you the classic TB303 experience with a hedonistic foray into the digital music revolution - from its rock roots in the development of drum machines and other electronic sonic developments.

Punk, grunge, indie and pop.

Ritual (DJ Barry)

Scottish Samba Showcase IV (Muleketu)

The Flying Duck, 20:00–22:00, £4

Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

Jeckyll on Hydepark Street (DJ’s CasperSly of the MixKings, Atari Sinclair, Bionik01, Audattack, Live TB303 sets from Autobahn Soundsystem, Pattern Against the User, The Subsonic Bionik, All the Queens Bovine)

The Twisted Wheel, 23:00–03:00, £3

Diverse music policy.

All The Young Nudes

Glasgow School of Art (Vic Gallery), 23:00–03:00, £4 (£3)

Classic Grand, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£4)

Spill

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Hip hop, house, drum & bass, funk, dance hall, electro, garage, break beat and disco.

Mixed Bizness

Damnation (DJ Barry & Dec)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £6

Junk (Marky Mark)

The Hip Drop (Robbie Rolex)

Tue 09 Jun

CCA, 20:00–01:00, £5

Indie.

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 21:00–03:00, £3, free b4 11.30pm

Soundhaus, 22:30–04:00, £10

Techno, breaks, house.

The Flying Duck, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

Brel, 21:00–01:00, Free

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £8

Psykick Dancehall Present (Jazzfinger, Blood Stereo, The Hunter Gracchus, and Towering Breaker)

Thu 11 Jun

Monox (Surgeon, Stephen Brown)

Fri 12 Jun Sound Museum (DJ Hushpuppy (Art School) & Chris Geddes (Belle & Sebastian))

Junk (Marky Mark)

Sub Club, 23:00–03:00, £10 (£9)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Optimo (Battant (KillTheDJ))

Nice ‘n’ Sleazy, 23:30–03:00, Free

Diverse music policy.

Splash 1 meets Studio 54 meets Jim Lambie.

Classic Grand, 23:00–03:00, £3

Fri 26 Jun

Ritual (DJ Barry)

Rock, Metal, Punk and Industrial tunes.

Mon 29 Jun

Mount Heart Attack Black Sparrow, 21:00–01:00, Free

Disco, electro, wonky techno and booty.

Burn (DJs Normski, Zeus & Mash)

The Buff Club, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

theskinny.co.uk/listings June 2009

THE SKINNY 63

edinburgh corn PRESENTS exchange

EDINBURGH CLUBS TUE 02 JUN MOTHERFUNK (FRYER & GINO) OPAL LOUNGE, 22:00–03:00, FREE

.. . party with

A chewed up, spat out mix of electro. pop, chart, indie and retro floor fillers.

SPLIT

GO COME [IT’S YO’ BIRTHDAY] (SUGAR SKULL, GET MESSY, IAN RYAN )

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

WED 03 JUN DELIQUENTS

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 22:30–03:00, £5

Two rooms of anthems and chart from residents

JUNGLEDUB

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, FREE

Dub, dubstep and jungle.

SUBTEXT

THE GRV, 23:00–03:00, FREE

Spanish and Latin Grooves from Juan Car.Techno, electro, breaks and minimal from various rotating guests including INGEN, Jealous Kid, C.L.B, AMELDRUM and Bruno FK.

THE PIT

SAT 3rd OCT £12.50

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

WE ARE ELECTRIC

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £2, FREE B4 12AM

The city’s leading punk-funk electrodisco party with resident electro-punk Gary Mac playing the sounds of Berlin & beyond.

THU 04 JUN WE CAN BE HEROES!

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 19:00–01:00, FREE

A kitschy intergalactic audio adventure

RUDE

PO NA NA, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£3)

Funky house, electro anthems, hip shaking urban jams, dirty sexy mash-ups and reinvented club classics.

2 DEGREES 2 HOT (MC TICKLE, FUNDRAISER FOR CLIMATE ACTION)

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £5

Hip hop.

KINKY INDIE

From indie and new wave to fidget house, Baltimore booty bass to nu-rave.

FRI 05 JUN OVERTIME (DJ B BURG )

MEDINA, 21:00–03:00, £5 (£4), FREE B4 11PM

PLANET EARTH

CITRUS CLUB, 22:30–03:00, £5, FREE B4 10.30PM

MISFITS

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, £4, FREE B4 11.30PM CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £10 (£6)

House night with skilled house house band

SAT 06 JUN MUCH MORE (NASTY P & CUNNIE)

MEDINA, 22:00–03:00, £5, 2 FOR 1 B4 11PM

MOOVN (PHIL ASHER, SHEA SOUL)

THE CAVES, 22:30–03:00, £9 (£7)

House & live percussion.

TEASE AGE

£5.00 www.tickets-scotland.co.uk 0131 220 3234 www.bebo.com/posevents

64 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

THE EGG (CHRIS & PAUL)

WEE RED BAR, 23:00–03:00, £5, £2.50 B4 11.30PM

Indie / 60’s Garage / Northern Soul / Ska / 70’s / Punk / New Wave. www.eggsite.co.uk

THE GO-GO (DJS TALL PAUL ROBINSON AND BIG GUS)

STUDIO 24, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4), FREE B4 12AM WITH FLYER

ULTRAGROOVE

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £7 (£5)

SUN 07 JUN WE HEART TAPES (EPIC 26)

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 16:00–19:00, £6

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

THE BANG BANG SUNDAY SOCIAL

THE SPEAKEASY @ CABARET VOLTAIRE, 16:00–23:00, £5

Chill out DJ sessions.

IT’S ALL GONE (ORTODOX)

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £3

House.

CITRUS CLUB, 22:30–03:00, £6, FREE B4 11PM

BUTTERCUP & PIXELS PRESENTS: ECCENTRICITY!

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 23:00–03:00, £TBC

Eclectic

BIG N BASHY (DD, BEAST + FAZE, DAVID GEORGE, DEBURGH & DECOY ROY)

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £6, £4 B4 12AM

A 4-deck mix of dubstep, reggae, dancehall + jungle

THE PIT

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

WE ARE ELECTRIC

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £2, FREE B4 12AM

The city’s leading punk-funk electrodisco party with resident electro-punk Gary Mac playing the sounds of Berlin & beyond.

THU 11 JUN WE CAN BE HEROES!

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 19:00–01:00, FREE

A kitschy intergalactic audio adventure

RUDE

PO NA NA, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£3)

Funky house, electro anthems, hip shaking urban jams, dirty sexy mash-ups and reinvented club classics.

KINKY INDIE

CITRUS CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £2 STUDENTS/ £5 OTHERS

KITSCH

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

Cheese.

SICK NOTE

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, FREE From indie and new wave to fidget house, Baltimore booty bass to nu-rave.

STRANGEBREW (CECCHINO [ITALY] & DJ CHIRUCHICK [ARGENTINA])

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £3, £2 IN FANCY DRESS

Rockabilly, surf, Italian ‘rocanroll’, mod, ska, reggae, mestizaje & soul.

FRI 12 JUN OVERTIME (DJ B BURG )

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 19:00–03:00, FREE

Chart

BALKANARAMA

STUDIO 24, 21:00–03:00, £6 BEFORE 11PM/ £8 AFTER

Live gypsy, klezmer and balkan beats

GET FUNK’D (ISLA BLIDGE, MASTERCAIRD & P-STYLZ)

MEDINA, 21:00–03:00, £5 (£4), FREE B4 11PM

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

PLANET EARTH

NEW IDOLS

70’s, 80’s and 90’s hits

THE SPEAKEASY @ CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £3 FOR FANCY DRESS, IDOLA-LIKES & STUDENTS

New Idols is Edinburgh’s new monthly Sunday night party night, featuring club classics, dance-not-dance and, yes, of course, New Idols being played on the wheels of steel.

GET FUNK’D (ISLA BLIDGE, MASTERCAIRD & P-STYLZ)

TOKYOBLU

Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire

THE JAZZ BAR, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3), £3 B4 11.30PM

2 rooms of Metal/Rock, Punk/PopPunk, EBM/Industrial, Goth/Grunge and Eighties.

Chart

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £5, £3 B4 12AM

Friday 17th July

SATURDAY NIGHT FISH FRY (ERIK D’VIKING)

SECTIONS

FOUR CORNERS (SIMON HODGE, JONNY CASHBACK & MONKEYBOY)

returns. . .

Hip hop and funk.

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 19:00–03:00, FREE

70’s, 80’s and 90’s hits

THE SPEAKEASY @ CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £3

Dance music.

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

R E P O R

GRAND THEFT AUDIO (BABES, MR MEEKS, B-SIDES & THE BANDIT, XTRA AND MONKEY BOY)

KITSCH

SICK NOTE

www.ece.uk.com

Electro, dubstep and house.

KILLER KITSCH

Cheese.

BOX OFFICE: 0131 443 0404

SNEAKY PETE’S, 23:00–03:00, FREE

CITRUS CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £2 STUDENTS/ £5 OTHERS THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

FRIDAY 28TH AUGUST TICKETS FROM £20

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, £4, FREE B4 11.30PM

ANTICS

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

supported by

BUBBLEGUM

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

MON 08 JUN THE LATIN QUARTER (JIM COMBE)

MEDINA, 21:00–03:00, FREE

MIXED UP MONDAYS

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

Hip Hop, RNB, Pop, Chart.

TRADE UNION (DJ BEEFY & WOLFJAZZ)

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £2, (£1), FREE B4 12AM

TUE 09 JUN MOTHERFUNK (FRYER & GINO) OPAL LOUNGE, 22:00–03:00, FREE

ANTICS

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

SPLIT

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, FREE

WED 10 JUN DELIQUENTS

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 22:30–03:00, £5

Two rooms of anthems and chart from residents

JUNGLEDUB

THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, FREE

Dub, dubstep and jungle.

SUBTEXT

THE GRV, 23:00–03:00, FREE

Spanish and Latin Grooves from Juan Car.Techno, electro, breaks and minimal from various rotating guests including INGEN, Jealous Kid, C.L.B, AMELDRUM and Bruno FK.

CITRUS CLUB, 22:30–03:00, £5, FREE B4 10.30PM

DIRT (BEEZER HOLMES, DJAMBA, INGEN, TACTUS)

THE GRV, 23:00–03:00, £2/4 AFTER 12AM

Techno, Electro, Dubstep, B-more, Ghetto

ALTERNATIVE (HERVE)

CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £10

House & techno.

MISFITS

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, £4, FREE B4 11.30PM

OUR HOUSE

THE SPEAKEASY @ CABARET VOLTAIRE, 23:00–03:00, £7, £6 B4 12AM

SYNTHETIC (JASON LEACH (SUBHEAD, TRESOR)) THE BONGO CLUB, 23:00–03:00, £7

SAT 13 JUN AUTOBAHN PROG 01 (ACTION GROUP, THE MONOSYNTH ORCHESTRA)

LEITH CRICKET CLUB, 18:00–03:00, £5

A festival of live, avant garde electronica

BALKANARAMA (ERDOGAN ORKESTRA, KUCHKE, MRS DJ GRANDMA STAFLAŠ, BLACK CAT) HMV PICTURE HOUSE, 21:00–03:00, £9, £7 B4 10.30PM

Balkan, gypsy, klezmer and East European music.

MUCH MORE (NASTY P & CUNNIE)

MEDINA, 22:00–03:00, £5, 2 FOR 1 B4 11PM

MUSIKA

FAITH, 22:00–03:00, £6

We Love Space Ibiza party.

TEASE AGE

CITRUS CLUB, 22:30–03:00, £6, FREE B4 11PM

WILDLIFE (HUGGY & DEAN NEWTON )

THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS, 23:00–03:00, £8

House, techno and minimal

ASCENSION (DJX, M.I.B.) STUDIO 24, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

Alternative goth, industrial & goth.

BUBBLEGUM

THE HIVE, 23:00–03:00, £4, FREE B4 11.30PM

A chewed up, spat out mix of electro. pop, chart, indie and retro floor fillers.

FAKE Vs BASS SYNDICATE (G-MAC & BELIEVE)

Sneaky Pete’s, 23:00–03:00, Free

GRAND THEFT AUDIO (Babes, Mr Meeks, B-Sides & The Bandit, Xtra and Monkey Boy) The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £3

Hip hop and funk.

Headspin

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, £7 (£5 b4 12am)

Karnival

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £7, £5 b4 12am

House & techno.

Saturday Night Fish Fry (Erik D’Viking)

The Jazz Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3), £3 b4 11.30pm

Substance (DMX KREW, GAVIN RICHARDSON, TERMITE, BRIAN D’SOUZA & PARANOISE) The GRV, 23:00–03:00, £7, £5 b4 12am

Techno, electro.

The Egg (Chris & Paul)

Wee Red Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5, £2.50 b4 11.30pm

Indie / 60’s Garage / Northern Soul / Ska / 70’s / Punk / New Wave. www.eggsite.co.uk

Sun 14 Jun WE HEART TAPES (Dead Boy Robotics)

The Electric Circus, 16:00–19:00, £6

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

THE BANG BANG SUNDAY SOCIAL

The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 16:00–23:00, £5

Chill out DJ sessions.

Unda-Ground Soul (DJ 2three) The GRV, 20:30–00:30, Free

Trade Union (DJ Beefy & Wolfjazz)

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £2, (£1), free b4 12am

Tue 16 Jun Motherfunk (Fryer & Gino) Opal Lounge, 22:00–03:00, Free

Antics

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, £4, free b4 11.30pm

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

Wed 17 Jun

Medina, 21:00–03:00, Free

Mixed Up Mondays

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

Hip Hop, RNB, Pop, Chart.

Where David Lynch fantasy becomes reality.

Misfits

Telefunken (Phil Weeks (Robsoul Record, Paris))

Sun 21 Jun WE HEART TAPES (Dirty Summer)

The Electric Circus, 16:00–19:00, £6

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

THE BANG BANG SUNDAY SOCIAL

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

Dance music.

The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

Funky vocal house, electro and club classics.

JungleDub

Studio 24, 23:00–03:00, £4

Dub, dubstep and jungle.

Subtext

The GRV, 23:00–03:00, Free

Spanish and Latin Grooves from Juan Car.Techno, electro, breaks and minimal from various rotating guests including INGEN, Jealous Kid, C.L.B, AMELDRUM and Bruno FK.

Old school rock ‘n’ roll, rockabilly, surf, blues and garage.

Sat 20 Jun Much More (Nasty P & Cunnie) Medina, 22:00–03:00, £5, 2 for 1 b4 11pm

Tease Age

The Pit

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

Citrus Club, 22:30–03:00, £6, free b4 11pm

We Are Electric

Bubblegum

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £2, free b4 12am

The city’s leading punk-funk electrodisco party with resident electro-punk Gary Mac playing the sounds of Berlin & beyond.

Thu 18 Jun The Voodoo Rooms, 19:00–01:00, £5 entry, £5 tournament

The Electric Circus, 19:00–01:00, Free

Rude

Po Na Na, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£3)

Funky house, electro anthems, hip shaking urban jams, dirty sexy mash-ups and reinvented club classics.

Audacious

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, £3

Breakcore, gabba, jungle, dubstep.

Kinky Indie

Citrus Club, 23:00–03:00, £2 students/ £5 others

Kitsch

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

Cheese.

Sick Note

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

From indie and new wave to fidget house, Baltimore booty bass to nu-rave.

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, £4, free b4 11.30pm

A chewed up, spat out mix of electro. pop, chart, indie and retro floor fillers.

GRAND THEFT AUDIO (Babes, Mr Meeks, B-Sides & The Bandit, Xtra and Monkey Boy) The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £3

Hip hop and funk.

Messenger Sound System

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, £6.50 (£5 b4 12am)

Sweet reggae rocking with Scotland’s original roots & culture sound system, feat MC Ras Echo. 360 degrees of consciousness www.myspace.com/messengersoundsystem

Saturday Night Fish Fry (Belleruche (Tru Thoughts))

Drum & bass.

The city’s leading punk-funk electrodisco party with resident electro-punk Gary Mac playing the sounds of Berlin & beyond.

ELECTROsexual (Lee Ryan (Blue))

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, £8

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £2, free b4 12am

Thu 25 Jun

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

Mon 22 Jun The Latin Quarter (Jim Combe)

Medina, 21:00–03:00, Free

Mixed Up Mondays

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

Hip Hop, RNB, Pop, Chart.

Trade Union (DJ Beefy & Wolfjazz)

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £2, (£1), free b4 12am

Tue 23 Jun Motherfunk (Fryer & Gino) Opal Lounge, 22:00–03:00, Free

Antics

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

Hybrid

The GRV, 23:00–03:00, Free

A kitschy intergalactic audio adventure

RUB-A-DUB STYLE

A melange of live swash buckling art, dance and music featuring Ruby & the Emeralds and The Banana Sessions

four four (Foursii & interflux) A progressive journey through electronic music with a 4/4 kick.

Rude

The Electric Circus, 23:00–03:00, £8

An velour caped mist of Burlesque, dance, theatre and performance; with or without Thierry Henry

Bubblegum

A chewed up, spat out mix of electro. pop, chart, indie and retro floor fillers.

Classic Rock

Studio 24, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

Po Na Na, 22:30–03:00, £5 (£3)

Funky house, electro anthems, hip shaking urban jams, dirty sexy mash-ups and reinvented club classics.

Kinky Indie

Citrus Club, 23:00–03:00, £2 students/ £5 others

Kitsch

Classic rock music.

GRAND THEFT AUDIO (Babes, Mr Meeks, B-Sides & The Bandit, Xtra and Monkey Boy) The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £3

Hip hop and funk.

Mumbo Jumbo

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, £7, £6 (£5 before 12am)

Sick Note

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

From indie and new wave to fidget house, Baltimore booty bass to nu-rave.

Funk, soul, electro & house.

Optimo (Battant (KillTheDJ)) Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £12

Diverse music policy.

Fri 26 Jun

The Egg (Chris & Paul)

Wee Red Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5, £2.50 b4 11.30pm

Autobahn

The Strathmore, 19:00–00:00, Free

Kraut rock, new wave, electro, synth pop and video nasties for the jaded and sexually ambivalent amongst you

OVERTIME (DJ B BURG )

Split

Citrus Club, 22:30–03:00, £5, free b4 10.30pm

Get Funk’d (Isla Blidge, Mastercaird & P-Stylz)

Indie / 60’s Garage / Northern Soul / Ska / 70’s / Punk / New Wave.

Saturday Night Fish Fry

The Jazz Bar, 23:30–03:00, £5/3 (before 11pm)

Sun 28 Jun

Medina, 21:00–03:00, £5 (£4), free b4 11pm

WE HEART TAPES (Fangs)

Planet Earth

A weekly Unders night featuring a melange of fine bands hosted by the Puppytooth DJs. Pip pip young sir

The Electric Circus, 16:00–19:00, £6

70’s, 80’s and 90’s hits

THE BANG BANG SUNDAY SOCIAL

Sugarbeat (BRODINSKI and SURKIN)

Cabaret Voltaire, 22:30–03:00, £tbc

The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 16:00–23:00, £5

Club For Heroes (House Of Traps)

ELECTROsexual (Lucky Luciano)

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, Free

Dirty bootlegs and cheeky electro.

DELIQUENTS

The Electric Circus, 22:30–03:00, £5

Chill out DJ sessions.

Breaks, beats, bootlegs.

JungleDub

Night for metalheads.

Dub, dubstep and jungle.

Psychedelic disco music from beyond the stars.

Subtext

Misfits

Indie / 60’s Garage / Northern Soul / Ska / 70’s / Punk / New Wave. www.eggsite.co.uk

VA VA -VOOM!!!!

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, £4, free b4 11.30pm

The GRV, 22:00–03:00, £3

Steelworks

Wee Red Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5, £2.50 b4 11.30pm

Citrus Club, 22:30–03:00, £6, free b4 11pm

Steven and Stewart’s electric knees-up

Medina, 22:00–03:00, £2-4 (fancy dress encouraged)

Two rooms of anthems and chart from residents

The Egg (Chris & Paul)

Tease Age

Sneaky Pete’s, 23:00–03:00, Free

The BIG freak - Sea Shantii’s & Gay Pirates

The Jazz Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3), £3 b4 11.30pm Studio 24, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£3)

Dirty bootlegs and cheeky electro.

Playdate

The Electric Circus, 19:00–03:00, Free

Wed 24 Jun

CC Blooms, 12:00–03:00, Free

Medina, 22:00–03:00, £5, 2 for 1 b4 11pm

WE CAN BE HEROES!

Every week will see different genres and artists from different clubs in Edinburgh: Noizteez, Volume, Ghantin, Mutiny, Dirt, Big n Bashy, Jakn, Synthetic, Coalition, Riddim Tuffa, Pangea.Techno, dubstep, drum and bass, hip hop. Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

Sat 27 Jun

Much More (Nasty P & Cunnie)

City Café, 21:00–01:00, Free

2 rooms of Metal/Rock, Punk/PopPunk, EBM/Industrial, Goth/Grunge and Eighties.

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, Free

We Are Electric

Killer Kitsch

Chill out DJ sessions.

House.

The Green Door

Xplicit (XAMPLE)

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

The Electric Circus, 19:00–01:00, Free

Two rooms of anthems and chart from residents

The Electric Circus, 22:30–03:00, £5

The Pit

The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 16:00–23:00, £5

Sections

A kitschy intergalactic audio adventure

The Latin Quarter (Jim Combe)

The Bongo Club, 23:00–03:00, £5

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £7 (£5)

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, £8, £6 b4 12am/NUS

Mon 15 Jun

Confusion is Sex

Ultragroove (CRAIG SMITH)

DELIQUENTS

WE CAN BE HEROES!

2 rooms of Metal/Rock, Punk/PopPunk, EBM/Industrial, Goth/Grunge and Eighties.

Planet Earth

Split

Dance music.

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, Free

Medina, 21:00–03:00, £5 (£4), free b4 11pm

70’s, 80’s and 90’s hits

Registration ends 7.30pm sharp.

Sections

Get Funk’d (Isla Blidge, Mastercaird & P-Stylz)

The GRV, 23:00–03:00, Free

Killer Kitsch

Funky vocal house, electro and club classics.

Chart

Citrus Club, 22:30–03:00, £5, free b4 10.30pm

The Ultimate Guitar Hero Fundraiser #2

The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

The Electric Circus, 19:00–03:00, Free

Hybrid

Soulful Underground Music, Boogie, Soul, Bruk, 2-step, Dubstep, Reggae and House. Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

Fri 19 Jun OVERTIME (DJ B BURG )

The GRV, 23:00–03:00, Free

Spanish and Latin Grooves from Juan Car.Techno, electro, breaks and minimal from various rotating guests including INGEN, Jealous Kid, C.L.B, AMELDRUM and Bruno FK.

Wee Red Bar, 23:00–03:00, £5 (£4)

The Hive, 23:00–03:00, £4, free b4 11.30pm

Pins & Needles (Den Haan)

Sneaky Pete’s, 23:00–03:00, £3, free b4 12am

Electro, techno, house.

CC Blooms, 23:00–03:00, Free

Killer Kitsch

Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

Dance music.

The Speakeasy @ Cabaret Voltaire, 23:00–03:00, Free

Funky vocal house, electro and club classics.

June 2009

THE SKINNY 65

Glasgow Comedy Tue 02 Jun Red Raw (With Billy Kirkwood and Phil Differ.) The Stand, 20:30–22:36, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Wed 03 Jun Wicked Wenches (Susa Murray, AL Kennedy, Bethany Black and Susan Calman) The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £6/£5

Thu 04 Jun Bratchy and the Wee Man’s Comedy Pub Quiz The Arches, 20:00–22:00, -

Teams of up to five people

The Thursday Show (With Brendan Dempsey, Susan Murray, Billy Kirkwood and Derek Johnston. Hosted by Bruce Devlin. ) The Stand, 21:00–23:06, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 05 Jun

Sun 14 Jun Michael Redmond’s Sunday Service

The Stand, 20:30–23:00, £5/£4

Mon 15 Jun Benefit in Aid of Alzheimer Scotland

The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £7/£5

Proceed to Alzheimers’ Scotland www. alzscot.org

Tue 16 Jun Red Raw (With Charlie Ross and Marcus Ryan.) The Stand, 20:30–22:36, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Wed 17 Jun Midweek Comedy Cabaret (Phil Nichol and Kevin Bridges) The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £4/£2

Thu 18 Jun Dingledodies (Russell Howard)

Glasgow Royal Concert Hall, 19:30–00:00, £15

The Friday Show (Brendan Dempsey, Susan Murray, Billy Kirkwood and Derek Johnston. Hosted by Bruce Devlin.)

The Thursday Show

Doors open 7pm

The Friday Show

The Stand, 21:00–23:05, £10/£9

Sat 06 Jun The Saturday Show (Brendan Dempsey, Susan Murray, Billy Kirkwood and Derek Johnston. Hosted by Bruce Devlin.) The Stand, 21:00–23:02, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

Sun 07 Jun Michael Redmond’s Sunday Service

The Stand, 20:30–23:00, £5/£4

Tue 09 Jun Red Raw (With Susan Calman.)

The Stand, 20:30–22:36, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Wed 10 Jun Midweek Comedy Cabaret (Graeme Thomas and John Ross) The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £4/£2

Thu 11 Jun The Thursday Show (Sean Percival, Liam McEneaney, Scott Agnew and Kim MacAskill. Hosted by Raymond Mearns.) The Stand, 21:00–23:06, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 12 Jun The Friday Show (Sean Percival, Liam McEneaney, Scott Agnew and Kim MacAskill. Hosted by Raymond Mearns.) The Stand, 21:00–23:05, £10/£9

Doors open 7pm

Sat 13 Jun The Saturday Show (Sean Percival, Liam McEneaney, Scott Agnew and Kim MacAskill. Hosted by Raymond Mearns.) The Stand, 21:00–23:02, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

The Stand, 21:00–23:06, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 19 Jun The Stand, 21:00–23:05, £10/£9

Doors open 7pm

Sat 20 Jun The Saturday Show The Stand, 21:00–23:02, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

Sun 21 Jun Michael Redmond’s Sunday Service

The Stand, 20:30–23:00, £5/£4

Mon 22 Jun Dance Monkey Boy Dance The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £4

Monthly show featuring a mix of topical stand-up, filmed sketches and improvised games and songs.

Tue 23 Jun Red Raw

The Stand, 20:30–22:36, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Wed 24 Jun Barry McDonald: Just A Man And His Will To Survive The Stand, 19:00–20:30, £5/£4

Thu 25 Jun The Thursday Show

The Stand, 21:00–23:06, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 26 Jun The Friday Show

The Stand, 21:00–23:05, £10/£9

Doors open 7pm

Sat 27 Jun The Saturday Show The Stand, 21:00–23:02, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

Sun 28 Jun Michael Redmond’s Sunday Service

The Stand, 20:30–23:00, £5/£4

Mon 29 Jun Dance Monkey Boy Dance The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £4

Monthly show featuring a mix of topical stand-up, filmed sketches and improvised games and songs.

66 THE SKINNY June 2009

Edinburgh Comedy Tue 02 Jun Wicked Wenches (Susa Murray, AL Kennedy, Bethany Black and Susan Calman) The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £6/£5

Thu 04 Jun The Thursday Show ( With Kevin Bridges, Bethany Black and Iain Stirling. Hosted by Raymond Mearns.) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 05 Jun The Friday Show (Kevin Bridges, Bethany Black and Todd Womack. Hosted by Raymond Mearns.) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £10/£9

Doors open 7pm

Sat 06 Jun The Saturday Show (Kevin Bridges, Bethany Black and Tom Womack. Hosted by Raymond Mearns.) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

Sun 07 Jun Whose Lunch Is It Anyway? The Stand, 12:30–15:00, Free

Improvised comedy led by by audience suggestions, with Stu and Garry.

Best of Irish Comedy Cruz, 19:30–21:30, £8/£7

The Sunday Night Laugh-In (With Marcus Ryan, Lucy Oldham and Gus Lymburn. Hosted by Billy Kirkwood. ) The Stand, 20:30–22:35, £5/£4

Mon 08 Jun Absolute Beginners (MC Gus Lymburn, Headliner Siân Bevan)

The Beehive Inn, 20:00–22:15, £2 /£1

Showcase of new comedy talent with a top headliner to round off your night www.fitothegiggles.com

Red Raw (With Scott Agnew.)

The Stand, 20:30–22:46, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Tue 09 Jun Jason John Whitehead and Ben Hurley - Infamous in the UK tour 2009 The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £8/£7

Wed 10 Jun Melting Pot

The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £5/£4

Watch a series of short comedy sketches, presented by top actors and comedians. Vote for your favourite, and see a longer version next month.

Thu 11 Jun The Thursday Show (With Andre Vincent, Rob & Skatz, Barry McDonald and Rick Molland. Hosted by Susan Calman.) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 12 Jun The Friday Show (Andre Vincent, Rob & Skatz, Barry McDonald and Rick Molland. Hosted by Susan Calman.) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £10/£9

Doors open 7pm

Sat 13 Jun The Saturday Show (Andre Vincent, Rob & Skatz and Rick Molland. Hosted by Susan Calman.) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

Sun 14 Jun

The Stand, 20:30–22:46, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Tue 16 Jun Midweek Comedy Cabaret (Phil Nicol) The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £4/£2

Wed 17 Jun Benefit in Aid of Voluntary Service Overseas (Line-up tbc) The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £7/£5

Proceeds to VSO - www.vso.org.uk

Thu 18 Jun The Thursday Show (With Phil Nichol, Martin McAllister and Gus Lymburn. Hosted by Susan Morrison.) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 19 Jun The Friday Show

The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £10/£9

Doors open 7pm

Sat 20 Jun The Saturday Show The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

Sun 21 Jun

Whose Lunch Is It Anyway?

Improvised comedy led by by audience suggestions, with Stu and Garry.

The Sunday Night LaughIn (With Rob & Skatz and Rick Molland. Hosted by Siân Bevan.)

The Sunday Night Laugh-In (With Katie Craig. Hosted by Scott Agnew.)

The Stand, 12:30–15:00, Free

The Stand, 20:30–22:35, £5/£4

Mon 15 Jun

The Stand, 12:30–15:00, Free

The Stand, 20:30–22:35, £5/£4

Mon 22 Jun

Absolute Beginners (MC Vladimir McTavish, Headliner Keara Murphy)

Absolute Beginners (MC Mikey Adams, Headliner Esmond Toni)

Showcase of new comedy talent with a top headliner to round off your night www.fitothegiggles.com

The Beehive Inn, 20:00–22:15, £2 /£1

Edinburgh Theatre King’s Theatre

Red Raw

Theatre Royal

The Beehive Inn, 20:00–22:15, £2 /£1

Festival Theatre

A View from the Bridge

Cosi Fan Tutte

19:30, 02 Jun—06 Jun, contact 0870 060 6647

Classic Millar, on tour from success in London

Multiple times, Thu 11th, Fri 12th, Sat 13th, Fri 19th, Sun 21st, Thu 25th, Sat 27th, Multiple prices

Mod classic, edgy at the time but more a nostalgia trip now, perhaps?

Kings Theatre Turandot 19:30, 11 Jun, 08712975454 for prices

Lavish opera

Aida 19:30, 12 Jun—13 Jun, 08712975454 for prices

Lavish opera

The Arches Raging Balls 19:15, 12 Jun, £3

Angry speech is encouraged by the artist David Wojnarowicz’s (1954-1992) potent performative diatribes against the American policies handling the AIDS crisis during the 1980s

Splinters 19:30, 15 Jun—20 Jun, £7

Al Seed gets educational- a graduating show from the class of the master of Physical Theatre

Tramway Maria Magdalena

19:30, 04 Jun—06 Jun, £12

The decadent conclusion to a trilogy of passion and crafted technique: multimedia Euro-theatre excellence

Say It’s Not True- Touching Tongues- Chora 19:30, 12 Jun—13 Jun, £10

Local boy done very good brings his latest choreography to Tramway

An Original Performance Work

A wry, comic, and heart-rending opera follows 24 hours in the lives of two sisters whose fiancés decide to test their faithfulness.

Manon Multiple times, Fri 12th, Sat 20th, Mon 22nd, Wed 24th, Multiple prices

A passionate and compelling account of a promising life that spirals out of control, Manon is a warning to those who are faced with too much opportunity in life, and who take too much, too soon.

19:30, 18 Jun—20 Jun, £8

From the successful avant-theatre populists

Tron Hoors

19:30, 02 Jun—06 Jun, from £10

The disappointing follow-up to BlackWatch (as claimed by the author). A comedy for come-downs.

Woolgatherer 19:30, 12 Jun, £5

Their job is to open up the door to your imagination, undermined by technology. But this time, the door won’t close...

The Stand, 20:30–22:46, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Wed 24 Jun The Best of Scottish Comedy (John Gillick, Steven Dick, Phil Differ and Andrew Learmonth.) The Stand, 20:30–22:30, £6/5

Thu 25 Jun The Thursday Show (With Sarah Millican, Mark Nelson, Andrew Stanley and Robert Graham. Hosted by Billy Kirkwood. ) The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £8/£7

Ease yourself into the weekend with top laughs and delicious food.

Fri 26 Jun The Friday Show

The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £10/£9

Doors open 7pm

Sat 27 Jun The Saturday Show The Stand, 21:00–23:00, £13

Top acts. Hot food. An altogether great night out.

Sun 28 Jun Whose Lunch Is It Anyway? The Stand, 12:30–15:00, Free

Improvised comedy led by by audience suggestions, with Stu and Garry.

The Sunday Night LaughIn (With Graeme Thomas and Jeff O’Boyle. Hosted by Ro Campbell.) The Stand, 20:30–22:35, £5/£4

Mon 29 Jun Absolute Beginners (MC Viv Gee, Headliner Keir McAllister)

The Beehive Inn, 20:00–22:15, £2 /£1

Showcase of new comedy talent with a top headliner to round off your night www.fitothegiggles.com

Red Raw (With Susan Calman and Kevin Bridges.) The Stand, 20:30–22:46, £2/£1

New acts, new material from old acts; a classic lucky dip of comedy.

Glasgow Theatre

Quadrophenia

19:30, 02 Jun—06 Jun

Red Raw (With Graeme Thomas and Billy Kirkwood.)

Royal Lyceum Peer Gynt 19:30, Tue 2nd, Wed 3rd, Thu 4th, Fri 5th, Wed 17th, Thu 18th, Fri 19th, Sat 20th, Multiple prices

The fantastically raucous adventures of a singular man.

The Tron Vision/Aria 19:30, 11 Jun—13 Jun, £8

Three performers unpick romantic love & mutual desires

Traverse Rehearsal Room 15

19:30, 04 Jun—06 Jun, Multiple prices

Stellar Quines offer a fascinating insight into their work process

3 Works

20:00, 05 Jun, from £8

Under the direction of Ross Cooper, The Curve Foundation’s dancers will be returning to the Traverse Theatre with a new challenging and exciting programme of pure dance

Paris Calling

19:30, 10 Jun—11 Jun, £5

Collaboration between the Traverse and French Theatre

Auntie Janet Saves The Planet 14:00, 19 Jun—21 Jun, £6

An interactive opera especially created for 3 to 6 year olds featuring live performance, film animation and puppetry.

T(r)apped

20:00, 20 Jun, £13

State-induced fear and a warped sense of reality are entwined to form a subtle commentary on both the CCTV-laden world of today and the bygone days of the former German Democratic Republic.

Dundee

Edinburgh Art Collective Commonwealth Suite 12:00, Tue 2nd–Sat 27th, Free

Two new film commissions, filmed in Edinburgh’s Royal Commonwealth Pool, just before it is closes for renovation in June 2009.

Corn Exchange In Colour

11:00, Fri 12th–Sat 27th, Free

Printmakers Incise

10:00, Tue 2nd–Sat 27th, Free

Francais d’Ecosse

Barbara Probst

09:30, 02 Jun—16 Jun, not 7th, 14th, Free

Photography from the German artist.

Watercolours and drawings inspired by Jean de la Fontaine’s short stories

Inverleith House CERITH WYN EVANS 10:00, Tue 2nd–Sun 28th, Free

FIRST solo exhibition in Scotland by the internationally acclaimed artist Cerith Wyn Evans.

Modern Art Artist Rooms 10:00, 02 Jun—28 Jun, Free

Embassy Gallery ANNUALE ‘09

12:00, Fri 19th, Sat 20th, Sun 21st, Thu 25th, Fri 26th, Sat 27th, Sun 28th, Free

THIS year sees the 6th edition of the Annuale, the festival of grassroots artistic activity

Fruitmarket Buried

Multiple times, 02 Jun—28 Jun, Free

At the heart of ARTIST ROOMS is the concept of individual rooms devoted to particular artists, so that their work can be seen and appreciated in depth.

Two Horizons 10:00, 02 Jun—28 Jun, Free

Roxy Arthouse Facade within 12:00, Fri 19th–Sun 28th, Free

Another new venue for the Embassy, with a satellite show for the Annuale

RSA Ingleby Gallery Francesca Woodman

10:00, 02 Jun—13 Jun, not 7th, Free

Ian Hamilton Finlay

10:00, 20 Jun—27 Jun, not 21st, Free

A major exhibition of sculpture and wall paintings from the estate of Ian Hamilton Finlay, one of the leading conceptual artists of the twentieth century

Stills

LA FONTAINE’S FABLES

Turner and Italy Multiple times, 02 Jun—07 Jun, £8(£6)

Explores the complex and enduring relationship between JMW Turner and Italy.

Offering on the verge Multiple times, 05 Jun—28 Jun, Free

AN exhibition of new paintings and works on paper by 2008 Alastair Salvesen Scholar, Lee O’Connor.

11:00, 02 Jun—28 Jun, Free

Excess: Experiments in Living Multiple times, Tue 2nd–Sat 27th, Free

GoMA sh[OUT]

10:00, 02 Jun—28 Jun, Free

Grosvenor ONE Magazine presents: Samuel Beckett’s FILM 14:00, 13 Jun, Free/ donation

Beckett’s sole project on celluloid, entitled ‘FILM’, followed by a discussion lead by John Calder, beckett’s friend and publisher.

Mary Mary Sentences not only words 12:00, Thu 4th–Sat 27th, Free

Recoat Gallery Crystal is the New Wolf 12:00, 02 Jun—06 Jun, Free

A collaborative exhibition featuring work from young Stirling-based artist Rue Five and established Londonbased illustrator Will Barras

SWG3 What are they doing in there?

12:00, 06 Jun—13 Jun, not 7th, 8th, Free

A project about women in prison and the criminal justice system

Street Level The Animals

BALKANARAMA

21:00, 12 Jun—13 Jun, £9, £7 b4 10.30pm

Balkan, gypsy, klezmer and East European music.

The Flying Duck All The Young Nudes

10:00, Tue 2nd–Sat 20th, Free

20:00, 21 Jun, Free

Modern Institute Thomas Houseago, Dieter Roth & André Thomkins

Multiple times, 02 Jun—11 Jun, not 7th, Free

Fri 05 Jun

Thu 04 Jun

Sat 06 Jun

Site specific works by a variety of artists across the Edinburgh University campus while the gallery’s closed.

CTRL*ALT*DEFEAT

The Reading Rooms, 22:30–03:00, £tbc

House

The Drill Hall

Fri 19 Jun

Dress Down

10:00, 10 Jun—13 Jun, Free

PANGEA

Scultpure and photography using dress as a metaphor for the human form.

The Reading Rooms, 22:30–03:00, £tbc

Electronica

Exposed 09

Sat 20 Jun

10:00, 17 Jun—26 Jun, not 21st, Free

Images from final year photography students at Stevenson College Edinburgh

Henderson

Monthly residency launch

Sat 27 Jun SPACEBALL

The Reading Rooms, 22:30–03:00, £tbc

Voodoo Rooms

Fri 05 Jun MAC FLOYD Fat Sam’s, 20:00–23:00, £10

Pink Floyd tribute

The Foxes The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Four-piece rock ‘n’ roll

Sat 06 Jun Singer songwriter

The Reading Rooms, 22:30–03:00, £tbc

Edinburgh street artist, Elph, presents a new collection commissioned in celebration of the 250th anniversary of Robert Burns.

Alternative indie rock

Felix Cartal DJ set

MESSENGER SOUND SYSTEM

10:00, 02 Jun—06 Jun, Free

The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £7.50

HORSE MCDONALD

Fri 26 Jun

Lest Bogles Catch Him Unawares – Elph versus Robert Burns

Broken Records

NEON NIGHTS

The Reading Rooms, 22:30–03:00, £tbc

Techno

Laptop Lounge

Fat Sam’s, 19:30–23:00, £15.50

Sun 07 Jun Pearl and the Puppets The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £5

Indie pop

Mon 08 Jun Soft Toy Emergency The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £4

Electro pop

20:00, 11 Jun, Free

Cutting-edge international and UK electronic music and video artists perform live in the venue and into the venue via the net

Art DCA

doggerfisher

The Associates

Built, Lacking

09:30, 02 Jun—13 Jun, not 7th, Free

Multiple times, 02 Jun—06 Jun, Free

Celebrating DCA’s 10th anniversary with a survey of work from Jordanstone trained artists

Vision @ Seabraes Dundee Degree Show

Tramway

09:30, 02 Jun—06 Jun, Free

Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design graduates present a wide range of work. The exhibition is running concurrently with the Society of Scottish Artists Annual Exhibition.

MFA Degree Show 2009 12:00, 18 Jun—28 Jun, not 22nd, Free

THE MFA is one of very few two-year postgraduate fine art programmes in the UK, and has played a significant role in establishing Glasgow as a dynamic international centre for contemporary art.

comedy Sat 06 Jun Just Laugh (Compere Bruce Fummey, Anvil Springstein, Steven Dick and Teddy)

WASPS Studios Fault Lines

Fat Sam’s, 21:00–23:00, £9.00 including free entry to nightclub

10:00, Fri 5th– Fri 19th, Free

www.justlaugh.co.uk

The show is by a group of around 25 3rd year students from the GSA. It contains films, photography, sculpture and installation.

Theatre

20:00, Tue 2nd, Tue 9th, Tue 16th, Tue 23rd, £4

The Slow Club

MUSIC

Techno

Desire Lines

12:00, Sat 6th–Sat 27th, Free

The Arches

MUSIC

The Reading Rooms, 22:30–03:00, £tbc

Glasgow Art Collins Gallery

clubs HEADWAY

Talbot Rice

Stirling

Dundee Rep

Washington Garcia

Balgay Hill

19:30, Tue 9th–Sat 27th, from £12

a story about a sublimely talented singer, about heroes, about fame and the glamour chase, but most of all, it’s a story that puts Dundee in the spotlight.

‘I Knew I Should’ve Taken that Right Turn at Albuquergue’ 12:00, Thu 4th–Sat 13th, Free

Tue 09 Jun Post War Years The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £5

Electro pop

Wed 10 Jun We Were Promised Jetpacks The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £5

Indie pop

Sat 13 Jun Core Album Launch The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £tbc

Mon 15 Jun Fred Morrison The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £8

Folk

Fri 19 Jun The Banter Thiefs The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £5

Indie Rock

Sat 20 Jun Beatnic Prestige: Single Launch Tour The Doghouse, 20:00–23:00, £5

Indie rock

Sun 28 Jun Athlete Fat Sam’s, 19:00–23:00, £tbc

Indie four-piece

Voyage de Nuit

The Tolbooth , 20:00–23:00, £10/8

Celtic harmonies fractured through flamenco and jazz prisms

Sat 06 Jun ROFL Heat 4 (vu ju day, another broken record, conspiracy 5, barfly at midnight) The Rock, 19:30–22:30, £3

Battle of the bands

Preston Reed

The Tolbooth , 20:00–23:00, £10/8

Blues, rock, funk and jazz one-man machine

Tue 09 Jun N.Y.C.o.S.

The Albert Halls, 19:03–21:30, £tbc

Annual summer concert

Thu 11 Jun Reloaded (Wave Machines) The Tolbooth , 19:00–23:00, £6

The Tolbooth’s platform for emerging acts

Wed 17 Jun Session A9

The Tolbooth , 20:00–23:00, £10/8

Fiddle ensemble

Fri 19 Jun The Electronic Bar

The Tolbooth , 19:00–23:00, Free

An orgy of laptops, sequencers, drum machines and samples

Sat 20 Jun A Hawk A Hacksaw (FAMILY ELAN)

The Tolbooth , 20:00–23:00, £12/10

The nomadic vagabonds hit town

Thu 25 Jun Reloaded

The Tolbooth , 19:00–23:00, £6

The Tolbooth’s platform for emerging acts

Fri 26 Jun Malcolm Middleton

The Tolbooth , 20:00–23:00, £12/10

Former Arab Strap man

Sat 27 Jun ROFL Final (34all, desolate dreams, for art thou romance ) The Rock, 19:30–22:30, £3

Battle of the bands finale, including the winner of heat 4

Alba String Quartet

The Tolbooth , 20:00–23:00, £10/8

Scottish-based ensemble

Art Stirling Smith Derek Robertson

Multiple times, 02 Jun—07 Jun, Free

Sculptural painting, prints and drawing

Changing Room

Get yer listings

online

theskinny.co.uk

How Children Learn Part one: Killycode 10:00, 02 Jun—06 Jun, Free

A two-part collaborative project exploring Scottish Folklore and culture through a progressively expanding corpus of net drawings, installation and sculpture

How Children Learn - Part two: Naughts & Crosses 10:00, Tue 9th–Sat 27th, Free

A two-part collaborative project exploring Scottish Folklore and culture through a progressively expanding corpus of net drawings, installation and sculpture

June 2009

THE SKINNY 67

Leith festival 2009 5th-14th June THU 04 JUN LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

FRI 05 JUN ALBATROSS

MARY B, 44 FERRY ROAD, 10:00–18:00, FREE

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–01:00, FREE

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

KILMARNOCK EDITION LIVE: AN EVENING WITH JOHN CAIRNEY THE RAJ, 19:00–20:45, £10 (£8)

BRUCE MORTON

CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, £8.00 ( £6.00 )

SPARROW & THE WORKSHOP, BLUEFLINT, RODDY NEILSON & PAT MCGARVEY THE VILLAGE, 19:30–23:00, 5

KIM EDGAR

ISO BAR, 20:00–22:00, £7 (£5)

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

LIGHTS OUT AFTER NINE WITH ROSY BLUE IN SUPPORT

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 20:00–00:00, £10 (£8)

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

ROSE LEAF, 20:00–01:00, FREE

LEITH SESSIONS - SVENGALI, SMOKING SUNDAYS AND THE ARKANES GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

KEARA MURPHY - LYRE BURD CRUZ, 22:00–23:00, 6

SAT 06 JUN ALBATROSS

MARY B, 44 FERRY ROAD, 10:00–18:00, FREE

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

TRANSGRESSION PARK, OCEAN TERMINAL, 20:00–23:00, £6 (£5)

THE RAJ, 19:00–20:00, 5

LEITH SESSIONS - DELTA MAINLINE, WHITE HEATH AND FRANTIC CHANT

LEITH COMMUNITY CENTRE, 19:00–21:00, £5 (£3)

GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

THE HERESY PROJECT CRUZ, 22:00–23:00, 5

SUN 07 JUN ALBATROSS

MARY B, 44 FERRY ROAD, 10:00–18:00, FREE

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–00:00, FREE

THE BIG BOOK SWAP - FREE BOOKS FOR EVERYBODY!

LEITH COMMUNITY CENTRE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

DAVID SMART ART EXHIBITION OCEAN TERMINAL, 12:00–17:00, FREE

LEITH VICTORIA A.A.C. BOXING SHOW

LEITH DOCKERS CLUB, 13:00–17:00, 5

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

BODA BAR, 13:00–00:00, FREE

SUNSHINE DELAY

THE VILLAGE, 13:30–16:00, FREE

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 14:00–16:00, £4 (£3)

SIKH OPEN DAY

GURU NANAK SIKH GURDWARA, 14:00–16:00, FREE

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–00:00, FREE

OPEN DAY AT HINDU MANDIRT CULTURE CENTRE HINDU MANDIR, 16:00–18:00, FREE

THE OUT OF THE BLUE DRILL HALL, 11:00–19:00, 0.5

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–01:00, FREE

LEITH FESTIVAL CHILDRENS WRITING

LEITH COMMUNITY CENTRE, 12:00–13:30, FREE

DAVID SMART ART EXHIBITION OCEAN TERMINAL, 12:00–17:00, FREE

EVERY PICTURE TELLS A STORY THE VILLAGE, 12:00–18:00, FREE

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

THE RAJ, 19:00–20:00, 5

BOLLYWOOD UNLIMITED

SOUTH LEITH PARISH CHURCH HALLS, 19:00–20:30, 5

TRAINSPOTTING TOURS

PORT O’ LEITH, 19:00–21:00, £4 (£3.50)

THE BEST OF SCOTTISH COMEDY

CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, £8.00 ( £7.00 )

FANATTICA

THE VILLAGE, 19:30–23:00, 5

THE CHILLI DOGS & FREIGHT PRESENT THE CELTEX SESSIONS QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–23:00, £7.50 (£6)

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

TRANSGRESSION SESSIONS

EDINBURGH SCULPTORS WORKSHOP, 11:00–15:00, FREE

SPACEWALK

YOU ARE HISTORY, YOU ARE LEGEND’ LA PASIONARA, BARCELONA, 1938.

SYLVAIN AYITE

LEITHAL IMAGES

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

LEITH SESSIONS - THE FUSILIERS, THE 48 AND THE REMNANT KINGS.

JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–01:00, FREE

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL

FIT O’ THE GIGGLES FINEST

IN A CLASS OF THEIR OWN - MILLIE GRAY

LEITH LIBRARY, 19:00–20:30, FREE MARY OF GUISE BARGE, 19:00–21:00, FREE

BUMCLOCK, SELLOTAPE AND THE TANGO RHUMS

ISO BAR, 20:00–21:00, 5

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

OCEAN TERMINAL, 11:00–17:00, FREE

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE

LEITH DOCKERS CLUB, 19:00–00:00, £7.00 ( £6.00 )

GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

CRUZ, 22:00–23:00, 6

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

20 MARITIME LANE, 19:30–21:30, FREE

ROSIE NIMMO & MARTIN LENNON

STAND UP SISTERS CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, 6

ALBATROSS

ANDREW BAIN QUINTET & THE EDINBURGH SCHOOLS JAZZ ORCHESTRA 20TH ANNIVERSARY CONCERT

FARMER’S MARKET

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–22:30, £8 (£5)

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

OUT OF THE BLUE DRILL HOLE, 14:30–15:30, 5

LEE PATTERSON & FRIENDS

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

TIMOTHY NEAT - A FILM RETROSPECTIVE

THE VILLAGE, 19:30–23:00, 5

ISO BAR, 20:00–22:30, £6 (£5)

TRANSGRESSION SESSIONS

TRANSGRESSION PARK, OCEAN TERMINAL, 20:00–23:00, £6 (£5)

FILM: TRAINSPOTTING

SOFI’S BAR, 20:30–22:00, FREE

LEITH SESSIONS - SKA AND FUNKY. AYE N AYE, RUBY AND THE EMERALDS AND THE DULL FUDDS. GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

20 MARITIME LANE, 11:30–15:00, FREE

DAVID SMART ART EXHIBITION OCEAN TERMINAL, 12:00–17:00, FREE

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 14:00–16:00, £4 (£3)

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

THE VILLAGE, 19:30–23:00, 5

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

TRANSGRESSION SESSIONS

TRANSGRESSION PARK, OCEAN TERMINAL, 20:00–23:00, £6 (£5)

LEITH SESSIONS - LITTLE DOSES, ANNIE STEVENSON AND THE FATILIST GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

FIT O’ THE GIGGLES FINEST CRUZ, 22:00–23:00, 6

THU 11 JUN ALBATROSS

MARY B, 44 FERRY ROAD, 10:00–18:00, FREE

FRI 12 JUN MARY B, 44 FERRY ROAD, 10:00–18:00, FREE OCEAN TERMINAL, 10:00–20:00, FREE ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–01:00, FREE

DAVID SMART ART EXHIBITION OCEAN TERMINAL, 12:00–17:00, FREE

LEITH SHORT FILM FESTIVAL

SOFI’S BAR, 12:00–01:00, FREE

OCEAN TERMINAL, 13:00–14:30, FREE

THE RECKONING

SIERRA METRO, 13:00–17:00, FREE

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON COMFORT ZONE

MARY OF GUISE BARGE, 18:30–22:00, FREE

THE WORD BIRDS THE RAJ, 19:00–21:00, 5

DUNCAN PLACE RESOURCE CENTRE, 13:30–15:00, FREE

TRAINSPOTTING TOURS

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

“FOUR DAYS” (STRANGE TOWN YOUTH THEATRE PRESENTS)

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

COMFORT ZONE

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 14:00–16:00, £4 (£3)

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

FIRST AID FOR FAIRIES & OTHER FABLED BEASTS

LEITH LIBRARY, 14:30–15:30, FREE

LEITH SHORT FILM FESTIVAL

PORT O’ LEITH, 19:00–21:00, £4 (£3.50)

LEITH ACADEMY, 19:30–20:25, £5 (£3) OUT OF THE BLUE DRILL HOLE, 19:30–20:30, 5

THE BEST OF SCOTTISH COMEDY

CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, £8.00 ( £7.00 )

FUNK’ WITH THE FREAKY FAMILY & THE CHANS

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–12:00, £10 (£7.50)

LEITH LINKS, 10:30–12:30, FREE

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

THE JAMMY DEVILS SUNDAY SESSIONS

TONY BLACK BOOK LAUNCH

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 18:30–20:30, £4 (£3)

GORDON BANKS & OTHERS

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

LUATH LITERATURE IN LEITH: DEATH OF A CHIEF WITH DOUGLAS WATT

KEARA MURPHY - LYRE BURD

CARRIERS QUARTERS, 18:30–21:00, FREE

THE VILLAGE, 19:00–01:00, 3

PIAZZA ON THE SHORE, 19:30–21:00, SUGGESTED DONATION £2

LABYRINTH

SOUTH LEITH PARISH CHURCH HALLS, 19:30–21:30, FREE

SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

OCEAN TERMINAL, 18:00–19:30, FREE

THE ‘PLACE’ PERFORMS…

DUNCAN PLACE RESOURCE CENTRE, 19:00–21:00, FREE

THE SHELLSUIT MASSACRE, SUPPORTED BY THE EX-MEN

LEITH DOCKERS CLUB, 19:00–00:00, £6.00 ( £5.00 )

ROBERT BURNS & THE DYING ART OF POETIC DISSENT

THE BEST OF IRISH COMEDY

THE RAJ, 19:30–21:00, FREE

CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, £8.00 ( £7.00 )

LEITH THEN & NOW

THE DECADES RETRO PARTY WITH SUPPORT FROM THE EO PLAYING HERBS HAPPY HALF HOUR

LEITH COMMUNITY CENTRE, 19:30–21:30, FREE

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–23:00, £7.50 (£6)

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

LEITH SESSIONS -CARRIE MACDONALD , THE BANJO LOUNGE TRIO , YUILL SCOTT , CHRISTINA CLAYHILLS, LITTLE PEBBLE AND PLUM CRUZ, 22:00–23:00, 6

LUATH LITERATURE: ISLAY WHISKEY LEGENDS WITH ROBIN LAING

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 18:30–20:30, £4 (£3)

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–23:00, £10 (£8.50)

EDINBURGH SCULPTURE WORKSHOP OPEN DAY

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL

OCEAN TERMINAL, 13:00–14:30, FREE

20 MARITIME LANE, 19:30–21:30, FREE

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

WESTERN SWING EXTRAVAGANZA WITH STETCH DAWRSON & MENDING HEARTS

SOUTH LEITH PARISH CHURCH HALL, 18:00–19:30, £10 (£6.50)

GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

THERE IS A BONNY FITBA TEAM - 50 YEARS ON THE HIBEE HIGHWAY BY TED BRACK

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

TAYLOR’S FUN FAIR

BODA BAR, 12:00–01:00, FREE

SOFI’S BAR, 12:00–01:00, FREE

CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, 5

CATRIONA CAMPBELL

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

THE EDINBURGH QUARTET

LEITH FESTIVAL TATTOO 2009

OUT OF THE BLUE ARTS MARKET

IMPROV WITH STU & GARRY

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

ABC - ARTISTS’ OPEN STUDIOS’ ALBION ROAD BUSINESS CENTRE, 11:00–18:00, FREE

LEITH DOCKERS CLUB, 19:00–00:00, £8.00 ( £7.00 )

GOLDRUSH

OCEAN TERMINAL, 11:00–17:00, FREE

SPACEWALK

OCEAN TERMINAL, 11:00–17:00, FREE

CHRIS BRADLEY, SUPPORTED BY KAT HEALY

SPACEWALK

SANNA PRESENTS...AT YOUR OWN PLACE

20 MARITIME LANE, 11:00–16:00, FREE

CEROC DANCE CLASS

Get your listings online at theskinny.co.uk/listings

THE SUGARING-OFF CABIN

MON 08 JUN BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

20 MARITIME LANE, 11:30–15:00, FREE

DAVID SMART ART EXHIBITION

20 MARITIME LANE, 19:30–21:30, FREE

TOM STADE

CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, £7.00 ( £6.00 )

GIANT TANK PRESENTS: MUSCLERUSK/ WOUNDED KNEE/ SCRIM/ DORA DOLL & ALI ROBERTSON

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–23:00, £5

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

LEITH SESSIONS - SILHOUETTES, I HEAR ECHOES AND SUPER CIVILIAN. GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

PHIL BUCKLEY’S STUPID WORLD TOUR CRUZ, 22:00–23:30, 5

WED 10 JUN STORYTELLER MARA MENZIES LEITH LIBRARY, 10:00–11:30, FREE

OCEAN TERMINAL, 12:00–17:00, FREE

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 14:00–16:00, £4 (£3)

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 18:30–20:30, £4 (£3)

LUATH LITERARTURE IN LEITH: ARTS OF RESISTANCE WITH ALAN RAICH & SANDY MOFFAT

68 THE SKINNY JUNE 2009

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

20 MARITIME LANE, 11:30–15:00, FREE

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–00:00, FREE

20 MARITIME LANE, 11:30–15:00, FREE

DAVID SMART ART EXHIBITION OCEAN TERMINAL, 12:00–17:00, FREE

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 14:00–16:00, £4 (£3)

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY

TRAINSPOTTING TOURS

PORT O’ LEITH, 19:00–21:00, £4 (£3.50)

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL AFTER THE FIRE - KAREN CAMPBELL

COMFORT ZONE

OCEAN TERMINAL, 18:30–19:30, FREE

OUT OF THE BLUE DRILL HOLE, 19:30–20:30, 5

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

WHORES & SORES

THE WATERLINE PUB, 19:30–21:00, 5

LUATH LITERATURE IN LEITH: BURNS IN LEITH WITH DONALD SMITH

SOUTH LEITH PARISH CHURCH HALL, 19:30–21:30, £8 (£6)

SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 18:30–20:30, £4 (£3)

THE RAJ, 19:00–20:00, £5 (£3)

LEITHAL IMAGES

MARY OF GUISE BARGE, 19:00–21:00, FREE

TRAINSPOTTING TOURS

PORT O’ LEITH, 19:00–21:00, £4 (£3.50)

LEITH SHORT FILM FESTIVAL

DUNCAN PLACE RESOURCE CENTRE, 19:00–22:00, FREE

ABERFELDY SUPPORTED BY THE GILLYFLOWERS

LEITH DOCKERS CLUB, 19:00–00:00, £10.00 ( £8.00 )

COMFORT ZONE

OUT OF THE BLUE DRILL HOLE, 19:30–20:30, 5

MUSIC AT ST. MARGARET’S PRESENT 23RD ANNUAL FESTIVAL CONCERT BY THE LEITH COMMUNITY CONCERT BAND. ST. MARGARET OF SCOTLAND, 19:30–21:00, 0

WHORES & SORES

THE WATERLINE PUB, 19:30–21:00, 5

STANTON & FRIENDS - LIVE FOLK FROM LEITH

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

MARY OF GUISE BARGE, 19:00–21:00, FREE

“FOUR DAYS” (STRANGE TOWN YOUTH THEATRE PRESENTS)

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

EXPLORE LEITH’S PAST & PRESENT

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

LEITHAL IMAGES

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

VLADIMIR MCTAVISH

CRUZ ON THE SHORE, 14:00–16:00, £4 (£3)

THE RAJ, 19:00–20:00, £5 (£3)

LEITH SHORT FILM FESTIVAL

DAVID SMART ART EXHIBITION OCEAN TERMINAL, 12:00–17:00, FREE

DUNCAN PLACE RESOURCE CENTRE, 15:30–17:00, FREE

CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, £8.00 ( £7.00 )

CARRIERS QUARTERS, 19:30–22:00, FREE

DUNCAN PLACE RESOURCE CENTRE, 19:00–22:00, FREE

LEITH ACADEMY, 19:30–20:25, £5 (£3)

HOMECOMING

SCOTTISH MINERAL & LAPIDARY CLUB - OPEN WEEK

20 MARITIME LANE, 19:30–21:30, FREE

TUCKER & THE SCATTERED FAMILY WITH ALEX CORNISH & THE ORAN SOCIAL THE VILLAGE, 19:30–23:00, 5

SWINGIN’ THE DOCKS

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–23:30, £6 (£5)

WILD COLONIAL BOYS

CRUZ, 19:30–09:30, £8.00 ( £6.00 )

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

TRANSGRESSION SESSIONS

TRANSGRESSION PARK, OCEAN TERMINAL, 20:00–23:00, £6 (£5)

LOVE, LIES AND LULLABIES

LEITH DOCKERS CLUB, 20:00–00:00, 7

LEITH SESSIONS - JAKIL, JONNY DEACON AND THE VIBE. GRANARY, 20:30–00:00, £7 (£5)

ABOUT ROBERT THE BRUCE CRUZ, 22:00–23:00, 5

SAT 13 JUN ALBATROSS

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE CARRIERS QUARTERS, 21:00–23:00, £3 (£2) CRUZ, 22:00–23:00, 6

SUN 14 JUN ALBATROSS

MARY B, 44 FERRY ROAD, 10:00–18:00, FREE

SPACEWALK

OCEAN TERMINAL, 11:00–17:00, FREE

BURN (LEITH FESTIVAL)

ROSE LEAF, 11:00–00:00, FREE

SUNSHINE ON LEITH

JOSEPH PEARCE’S, 11:00–00:00, FREE

THE RECKONING

SIERRA METRO, 13:00–17:00, FREE

EX HIBS PLAYERS VS LEITH ATHLETIC FOOTBALL MATCH

LEITH ATHLETIC FOOTBALL PITCH, LEITH LINKS, 14:00–17:00, FREE

MOORINGS - PAINTINGS BY CATRIONA CAMPBELL SOFI’S BAR, 14:00–00:00, FREE

BRIGHT PERSPECTIVE - SUZANNE GIBSON

BODA BAR, 14:00–01:00, FREE

SIMON KEMPSTONE & FRIENDS THE VILLAGE, 18:30–20:30, 5

THE JAMMY DEVILS SUNDAY SESSIONS

CARRIERS QUARTERS, 18:30–21:00, FREE

TIMOTHY NEAT - A FILM RETROSPECTIVE

MARY OF GUISE BARGE, 18:30–22:00, FREE

TRAINSPOTTING TOURS

PORT O’ LEITH, 19:00–21:00, £4 (£3.50)

TAM WHITE & THE SHOESTRING BAND

LEITH DOCKERS CLUB, 19:00–00:00, 10

KEVIN BRIDGES CRUZ, 19:30–21:30, 8

THE EDINBURGH ORIGINALS, RANTUM SCANTUM & ALL THEIR FRIENDS

QUEEN CHARLOTTE ROOMS, 19:30–23:00, £7.50 (£6)

LEITH FESTIVAL STORYTELLING CLUB

MARY B, 44 FERRY ROAD, 10:00–18:00, FREE

VICTORIA, 20:00–22:00, FREE

MASONIC CLUB, 19:30–22:30, £5 (£3)

THE WEE BABY JESUSES

FARMER’S MARKET

TRANSGRESSION PARK, OCEAN TERMINAL, 20:00–23:00, £6 (£5)

CEROC DANCE CLASS THE VILLAGE, 19:30–23:00, 5

OCEAN TERMINAL, 10:00–19:00, FREE

TRANSGRESSION SESSIONS

ABERDEEN ART

ABERDEEN MUSIC TUE 02 JUN BROKEN RECORDS

MOSHULU, 19:30–22:00, £7.50

Edinburgh collective of an Arcade Fire string persuasion. Big sound from a band on their way up. http://www.myspace.com/brokenrecordsedinburgh

DYSTOPIA, 11.11, SEMPFERI, DEBASSED

CAFÉ DRUMMONDS, 20:00–23:00, £TBC

Punk and grindcore

PEARL AND THE PUPPETS + SUPPORT

THE TUNNELS, 20:00–23:00, TBC

Elton John’s support act get warmed up for the Scottish festival circuit. http://www.myspace.com/pearlandthepuppets

WED 03 JUN JOAN OF ARC + SUPPORT: COPY HA-HO, LOVE OF EVERYTHING, WONDERSWAN THE TUNNELS, 19:30–22:30, £6.50

Joan of Arc are on tour with their new album ‘Flowers’ which is out on the 9th June. http://www.myspace.com/joanfrc

THE FOXES

CAFÉ DRUMMONDS, 20:00–23:00, £TBC

Four-piece rock ‘n’ roll

THU 04 JUN SERPICO, HOT MANGU, DOWNFALL, LIARS DICE.

EXPOSURE (DO IT! DJS + I | R | L + FREE KORPS + MARIONETTES + CAST OF THE CAPITAL )

THE LEMON TREE, 21:00–01:00, £5

Kicking local line-up with bands, visuals + DJs making a grand party for y’all. http://www.myspace.com/exposurepromotion

SAT 06 JUN JAKE AND ELWOOD

MUSIC HALL, 19:30–23:00, £21.50

Blues brothers show

OUR LUNAR ACTIVITIES (THE COLOUR PROPOSAL, PROJECT 6) THE TUNNELS, 19:30–23:00, £5

Alt. rock

FUDGE MUSIC PRESENTS (MEXICO + M.I.N.E. + KALAMAZOO + RISE)

THE MOORINGS BAR , 20:00–23:00, £3

Alternative rock line-up.

REDFOOT THE FENCE, THE STANDARD

CAFÉ DRUMMONDS, 20:00–23:00, £TBC

Alt. indie

SUN 07 JUN BELHAVEN SUNDAY JAZZ

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

DAVE HOUSE

CAFÉ DRUMMONDS, 19:30–23:00, £TBC

Punk and powerpop

MON 08 JUN

FUDGE MUSIC PRESENTS (SNAKE TEMPLE KINGS + THE BROWNIES + SAN TOY + TBC) THE MOORINGS BAR , 20:00–23:00, £3

Alternative rock line-up in the best pirate bar in town.

SUN 14 JUN BELHAVEN SUNDAY JAZZ

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

SHARED SONGS

THE LEMON TREE, 19:30–23:00, £10.90

With Debra Salem and Michelle Burke

MON 15 JUN SESSION A9 & BEYOND

MUSIC HALL, 19:30–22:00, £14.50

The ensemble showcase their sophmore effort, Bottlenecks and Armbreakers

BLACK TOOTH ROCK LOUNGE (FUDGE DJS) SNAFU, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

As well as dancefloor gems from the Fudge DJs, expect touring bands, local barnyard rockstars, groupies, dark cabaret and burlesque. http://www.myspace.com/

WED 17 JUN JAMIE T

MOSHULU, 19:00–22:00, £12.50

Urban squire back with his latest wiselings.

THU 18 JUN

Rock, punk and metal bill with headliners Serpico promoting new album ‘Neon Wasteland’. http://www.myspace.com/serpicoband

TEITUR

GILAD ATZMON AND THE REAL JAZZ QUARTET

CARLSBERG’S UNSIGNED (THE DEBUTS, LADY MERCEDES, THE SOCIAL CHAMELEONS )

SNAFU, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

THE TUNNELS, 19:30–22:30, TBC

THE FORUM, 20:30–01:00, £3.50

New live music night to showcase local talent, sponsored by Carlsberg

THE DIRTY HEARTS CLUB (HOLY GHOST!(DFA / NEW YORK) DJ SET) SNAFU, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances http://www.myspace.com/dirtyheartsclubsnafu

PAPA MOJO

CAFÉ DRUMMONDS, 22:30–03:00, £TBC

Blues

FRI 05 JUN SHELL FRIDAY LIVE

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

Weekly sessions with local blues and folk singers

SUMMER CONCERT (ABERDEEN ORPHEUS CHOIR AND ALBYN SCHOOL ENSEMBLE) THE COWDRAY HALL, 19:30–21:29, £7.50/5.50

THE LITTLE KICKS ALBUM LAUNCH PARTY

THE TUNNELS, 19:30–22:30, £5 (INCLUDES ENTRY TO CLUB HOURS)

Been a while since the Aberdeen 4-piece entertained their loyal followers live on homesoil. Now they’ve got a full LP release to celebrate too. Big night, don’t miss! Chutes in support. http://www.myspace.com/thelittlekicks

NITROGEN PROMOTIONS PRESENTS: (BROKENCYDE + KILL PARADISE + SYNTHETIC SEASON)

MOSHULU, 19:30–22:30, £10 (INCLUDES ENTRY TO CLUB)

Screamo, crunkcore, electronic, experimental, hip hop from New Mexico’s most riotous pain in the asses. http://www.myspace.com/brokencyde

THE OXBOW LAKE ORCHESTRA, GHOSTS OF PROGRESS, ANDY TUCKER

CAFÉ DRUMMONDS, 20:00–23:00, £TBC

Acoustic and roots

THE LEMON TREE, 20:00–23:00, £7

THE LEMON TREE, 19:30–22:00, £13.75

Nordic folk

Leading saxophonist

BLACK TOOTH ROCK LOUNGE (FUDGE DJS)

FUNK MACHINE PRESENT: (BELLERUCHE, SUPER SIX FUNK MACHINE, KID BELL)

As well as dancefloor gems from the Fudge DJs, expect touring bands, local barnyard rockstars, groupies, dark cabaret and burlesque. http://www.myspace.com/

TUE 09 JUN HOWARD ELLIOT PAYNE

THE LEMON TREE, 19:30–22:30, £5

Brit rock

WED 10 JUN

THE BLUE LAMP, 20:30–01:00, £8 ADVANCE (ONE-UP/EARL)

THE DIRTY HEARTS CLUB (DHC DJS)

SNAFU, 21:00–02:00, FREE

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances http://www.myspace.com/dirtyheartsclubsnafu

FRI 19 JUN

CLASSICAL NIGHT

SHELL FRIDAY LIVE

Featuring recent graduates from the University of Aberdeen

Weekly sessions with local blues and folk singers

THE TUNNELS, 19:30–23:00, £3

FUNK MACHINE PRESENT: (SUPER SIX + OPEN + COBRA KAI + SOUL SITUATION) THE TUNNELS, 20:00–23:00, £4

Geordie phunksters join local sixpiece legends plus more. http://www.myspace.com/opentunes http://www.myspace.com/supersixfunkmachine

THU 11 JUN THE DIRTY HEARTS CLUB (DHC DJS)

SNAFU, 21:00–02:00, FREE

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances http://www.myspace.com/dirtyheartsclubsnafu

FRI 12 JUN SHELL FRIDAY LIVE

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

Weekly sessions with local blues and folk singers

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

SAT 20 JUN WOODEND WEEKEND MIDSUMMER MINI FEST (FINDLAY NAPIER AND THE BAR ROOM MOUNTAINEERS, CLACHAN YELL, THE JANI LANG BAND, MICHAEL WESTON KING, DOGHOUSE ROSES, THE LAST DIVIDE, LUIZA STANIEC AND ALS AND THE PUSSYCATS.) WOODEND BARN, 19:30–01:00, £15 PER NIGHT / £25 WEEKEND

FUDGE MUSIC PRESENTS (IRN MADEIN (FORMERLY MAIDEN SCOTLAND) + DOWNFALL + THRASHIST REGIME) THE MOORINGS BAR , 20:00–23:00, £TBC

Ok they had the best tribute name already... but now they’ve gone and changed it to one not quite as good but still rockin.

THE PAUL MCKENNA BAND THE LEMON TREE, 20:00–23:00, £9

Traditional folk for the new age

SUN 21 JUN

MARTIN TAYLOR

BELHAVEN SUNDAY JAZZ

Jazz guitarist

VOYAGE DE NUIT

THE LEMON TREE, 19:30–22:00, £14

SAT 13 JUN A FUNNY VALENTINE: THE STORY AND MUSIC OF CHET BAKER (COLIN STEELE (TRUMPET), DAVE MILLIGAN (PIANO) ) WOODEND BARN, 20:00–23:00, £10/7

The inside story of Chet Baker probably the most gifted trumpet player of his generation - and his untimely death.

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE THE LEMON TREE, 19:00–23:00, £8

Tune Up collaboration, featuring Scottish-based flautist and singer Nuala Kennedy alongside the French flamenco-jazz group Azulejo

MON 22 JUN KATERWAUL

THE TUNNELS, 19:30–23:00, £TBC

‘Progressively ambient’ .. i.e, they get louder and louder

BLACK TOOTH ROCK LOUNGE (FUDGE DJS) SNAFU, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

As well as dancefloor gems from the Fudge DJs, expect touring bands, local barnyard rockstars, groupies, dark cabaret and burlesque. http://www.myspace.com/

WED 24 JUN UNICORN KID

MOSHULU, 19:00–22:00, £5

Pop, Electro + Happy Hardcore Leither. All the elements, you could say, for live mayhem. http://www.myspace.com/unicornkid

ABERDEEN ART TALK: WORK, REST AND PLAY 12:30, 03 JUN, FREE

Exploring how different artists have responded to the changing patterns of work and leisure from the late eighteenth century onwards and traces common themes and subject matter throughout this period.

GREEN DROPS AND MOONSQUIRTERS

10:00, SAT 13TH, TUE 16TH, WED 17TH, THU 18TH, FRI 19TH, SAT 20TH, TUE 23RD, WED 24TH, THU 25TH, FRI 26TH, SAT 27TH, FREE

MARITIME MUSEUM

NEIL YOUNG

ABERDEEN SUPPORTED

His middle name is Percival, you might need that for a quiz. Don’t say we’re not good to you

Ships portraits of offshore support vessels by Robert Andrew

AECC, 19:00–23:00, £50-55

THU 25 JUN IMP PRESENTS (ACOUSTIC LADYLAND)

THE TUNNELS, 20:00–23:00, £8 ADVANCE (ONE-UP)

Taking you on a jazzed up trip like relatively no other. Café Cremes at the ready. http://www.myspace.com/acousticladylandmusic

THE DIRTY HEARTS CLUB (LOST KNIVES, DHC DJS) SNAFU, 22:01–02:00, £3/2

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances http://www.myspace.com/dirtyheartsclubsnafu

FRI 26 JUN SHELL FRIDAY LIVE

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

Weekly sessions with local blues and folk singers

THE DEBUTS

MOSHULU, 19:30–22:00, £5

Brit indie-heads from Auld Reekie. http://www.myspace.com/thedebutsmusic

DOORS ALIVE

THE LEMON TREE, 20:30–23:00, £12

Tribute

SAT 27 JUN MALCOLM MIDDLETON + PICTISH TRAIL

THE TUNNELS, 19:30–22:00, £10

Ex Arab Stap honcho and Fence Collective breathrough artist doubleup for a goodun. http://www.malcolmmiddleton.co.uk http://www.myspace.com/pictishtrail

10:00, 26 JUN—28 JUN, FREE

PEACOCK VISUAL ARTS CINE CLUB

19:00, 02 JUN, FREE

Controversial Swedish film exploring a father’s pre-empted questions on his yet unborn daughter’s future. (Jan Troell, 1988, 185min)

BREAKFAST MEETING

09:00, 04 JUN, £10 (INCLUDES BREAKFAST)

INTRODUCTION TO SCREENPRINTING

10:00, 06 JUN—07 JUN, £90/70

35 YEARS OF GREAT STUFF!

09:30, SAT 13TH, TUE 16TH, WED 17TH, THU 18TH, FRI 19TH, SAT 20TH, TUE 23RD, WED 24TH, THU 25TH, FRI 26TH, SAT 27TH, FREE

THE SPRING BOOK OF LAMBS 09:30, SAT 13TH, TUE 16TH, WED 17TH, THU 18TH, FRI 19TH, SAT 20TH, TUE 23RD, WED 24TH, THU 25TH, FRI 26TH, SAT 27TH, FREE (CHECK DETAILS FOR CLASSES)

BELMONT PICTURE HOUSE CHLOE GOUGH

A playful exploration of colour, pattern, image and surface in Blyth’s first suite of screenprints. Check the Peacock website for further events including felting classes and a butcher demonstration. Oh, and the ensuing BBQ!

13:00, 04 JUN—28 JUN, FREE

FOYER RESTAURANT MARK MCCRACKEN

11:00, 02 JUN—06 JUN, FREE

New paintings and drawings of some famous faces executed with a pixelated technique most effective on the clinical walls of Foyer. http://www.foyerrestaurant.com/ gallery.html

GRAY’S SCHOOL OF ART

CREATIVE CUTLTURES

18:00, 18 JUN, FREE (INCLUDING REFRESHMENTS + NIBBLES)

OPEN KNOWLEDGE NETWORKS (OKN4)

18:30, 26 JUN, FREE (INCLUDING A FEW BEERS!)

WOODEND BARN

GRAY’S DEGREE SHOW 2009

WILD AND PRECIOUS

10:00, 13 JUN—20 JUN, FREE

KILAU KILAU2

MULTIPLE TIMES, 02 JUN—20 JUN, FREE

New works from an exceptional local talent in Aberdeen. Silkscreens and mono-prints at the helm. http://jogannon.wordpress.com/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/jogannon

09:00, TUE 2ND, WED 3RD, THU 4TH, FRI 5TH, MON 8TH, TUE 9TH, WED 10TH, THU 11TH, FRI 12TH, MON 15TH, TUE 16TH, WED 17TH, THU 18TH, FRI 19TH, MON 22ND, TUE 23RD, WED 24TH, THU 25TH, FRI 26TH, FREE

Sandra Emslie, Fran Marquis, Liz Skulina, Jane Chisholm, Emma Cooper, Judith Burbidge and Annis Fitzhugh exhibit artwork together in a variety of media including painting, ceramics, weaving, print and photography.

MIXED MEDIA WORKSHOPS

MUSA

12:00, THU 4TH, THU 11TH, THU 18TH, £60 (4 WEEKS)

SILK

10:00, SAT 6TH, SAT 13TH, SAT 20TH, SAT 27TH, FREE

An art exhibition ‘touched by silk’ with lucious works from Fiona Duckett, Ranjit Barry, Kirsty Aitken, Norma Galley and Linda Bullock

Marga returns to the Barn to run a painting/drawing course using mixed media, and discovering different mark making techniques with the Barn allotments providing inspiration. http://www.woodendbarn.co.uk/

POSTCARDS FROM LEITH

JAMIE JOHNSON - DRAWINGS FROM ZINE "POSTCARDS FROM LEITH" OWLANDLIONGALLERY.COM WWW.JAMIE-JOHNSON.BLOGSPOT.COM

MOSHULU PRESENTS: (MILES HUNT (WONDER STUFF) + DAVE SHARP (THE ALARM)) MOSHULU, 19:30–22:30, £8

Ex-Wonder Stuff top dawg doing in his solo thing, albeit with full backing band. http://www.myspace.com/theactualmileshunt

THE IVAN DREVER BAND

THE LEMON TREE, 20:00–22:00, £TBC

Folk from the former frontman of Wolfstone

FUDGE MUSIC PRESENTS (TUPELO TOWN ASSEMBLY + THE ACID FASCISTS + DESCARTES + WINTER IN SIBERIA) THE MOORINGS BAR , 20:00–23:30, £3

Blues and rock’n’roll from the howlin’ and howlerlin’ local groovsters. http://www.myspace.com/tupelotownassembly

SUN 28 JUN BELHAVEN SUNDAY JAZZ

THE LEMON TREE, 12:00–14:00, FREE

MON 29 JUN ATHLETE

THE LEMON TREE, 19:30–22:00, £15.50

The indie mainstays, third album on

JUNE 2009

THE SKINNY 69

Aberdeen Clubs Wed 03 Jun Zombie Disco

Snafu, 22:00–02:00, £3

Martin Jay hosts the a midweek session where the finest of overground and underground gets mixed into one big eclectic pot. Student night but for the more discerning listener. (‘Crush’ 1st Wed of the month with the crazy kids)

Thu 04 Jun The Dirty Hearts Club (HOLY GHOST!(DFA / NEW YORK) DJ SET) Snafu, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances

Electric Institute (Krazzy Martin and Talcolm X ) Korova, 23:00–02:00, Free

Weekly electro, house and techno to keep Aberdeen sweaty

Fri 05 Jun ELECTROSEX (Lucky Luciano) Foundation Nightclub, 22:00–03:00, £4, £2 b4 12am

Cheeky electro remixes and nasty bootlegs. Free glowsticks.

Indo Silver Club

The Tunnels, 22:00–03:00, £3

Electro, disco and indie visuals

Kamikazi (DJ ADAM) Moshulu, 22:00–03:00, £3

Kamikazi is Aberdeens longest standing champion of rock. Every Friday expect 500+ folks for one of the biggest alternative nights in the north-east.

Mixtape

Snafu, 22:00–03:00, variable

Weekly club sessions in the dirty side of electronic moosick. Giles Walker resides, most of the time.

Sat 06 Jun Full Spektrum Vs Electric Istitute (DJ Y2D, D:LIVA, Krazzy Martin, EEZMA) Korova, 22:00–02:00, £2 after midnight

Drum’n’Bass / Dubstep Vs Electro / House + Techno

Drama (Lucky Luciano)

Foundation Nightclub, 22:00–03:00, £6 (£4)

Remixes and mashups.

The Deep End (Pat Mahoney (DFA) Q-Burns Abstract Message (Orlando) Funky Transport (Classic)) Snafu, 22:00–03:00, £10

Each and every Saturday your host Funky Transport delivers house music in its purest form. Just the good stuff for music lovers. Mr Green in assistance too.

Adventures in Stereo (STEVEN MILNE) Moshulu, 22:30–03:00, £3

Classic Indie and 60s/70s rock tunes, to the latest Electro/ Dance / New Wave classics along with the latest Indie Seven Inches!

CUT/EDIT/REWIND (DJ KidProQuo)

The Tunnels, 23:00–03:00, TBC

Acollection of different style Hip-Hop DJ’s and artists from your very own backdoor to halfway round the World giving it the best in turntabiliism trickery to techno effects tom foolery.

Mon 08 Jun Black Tooth Rock Lounge (fudge DJs) Snafu, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

As well as dancefloor gems from the Fudge DJs, expect touring bands, local barnyard rockstars, groupies, dark cabaret and burlesque.

Wed 10 Jun Zombie Disco (Martin ‘T-Bone’ Jay)

Sat 13 Jun

Snafu, 22:00–02:00, free

Snafu, 22:00–03:00, £6/4

Adventures in Stereo (STEVEN MILNE)

Thu 11 Jun The Dirty Hearts Club (DHC DJs) Snafu, 21:00–02:00, FREE

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances

Electric Institute (Krazzy Martin and Talcolm X ) Korova, 23:00–02:00, Free

Weekly electro, house and techno to keep Aberdeen sweaty

Fri 12 Jun Indo Silver Club The Tunnels, 22:00–03:00, £3

Electro, disco and indie visuals

Kamikazi (DJ ADAM) Moshulu, 22:00–03:00, £3

Kamikazi is Aberdeens longest standing champion of rock. Every Friday expect 500+ folks for one of the biggest alternative nights in the north-east.

Mixtape Snafu, 22:00–03:00, variable

Weekly club sessions in the dirty side of electronic moosick. Giles Walker resides, most of the time.

Thu 18 Jun

The Deep End (funky transport, mr green) Each and every Saturday your host Funky Transport delivers house music in its purest form. Just the good stuff for music lovers. Mr Green in assistance too.

Black Tooth Rock Lounge (fudge DJs)

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances

As well as dancefloor gems from the Fudge DJs, expect touring bands, local barnyard rockstars, groupies, dark cabaret and burlesque.

Snafu, 21:00–02:00, FREE

Classic Indie and 60s/70s rock tunes, to the latest Electro/ Dance / New Wave classics along with the latest Indie Seven Inches!

Weekly electro, house and techno to keep Aberdeen sweaty

Fri 19 Jun The Tunnels, 22:00–03:00, £3

Kamikazi (DJ ADAM)

Petrocollapse The Tunnels, 23:00–03:00, £3

Jungle, Dub-step, Soca, Grime, Hip-hop.

Mon 15 Jun

Moshulu, 22:00–03:00, £3

Kamikazi is Aberdeens longest standing champion of rock. Every Friday expect 500+ folks for one of the biggest alternative nights in the north-east.

Mixtape

Black Tooth Rock Lounge (fudge DJs) Snafu, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

As well as dancefloor gems from the Fudge DJs, expect touring bands, local barnyard rockstars, groupies, dark cabaret and burlesque.

Snafu, 22:00–03:00, variable

Weekly club sessions in the dirty side of electronic moosick. Giles Walker resides, most of the time.

Sat 20 Jun The Deep End (funky transport, mr green) Snafu, 22:00–03:00, £6/4

Wed 17 Jun Zombie Disco (Martin ‘T-Bone’ Jay) Snafu, 22:00–02:00, free

Wed 24 Jun Electrique Boutique (Switch? P.E.D.S + DICKIE DRYSDALE)

Snafu, 23:01–02:00, £3 (Free passes upstairs)

Indo Silver Club

Electro, disco and indie visuals

Sun 14 Jun

Snafu, 21:00–02:00, £3/2

Electric Institute (Krazzy Martin and Talcolm X ) Korova, 23:00–02:00, Free

Moshulu, 22:30–03:00, £3

Mon 22 Jun

The Dirty Hearts Club (DHC DJs)

Each and every Saturday your host Funky Transport delivers house music in its purest form. Just the good stuff for music lovers. Mr Green in assistance too.

Adventures in Stereo (STEVEN MILNE) Moshulu, 22:30–03:00, £3

Classic Indie and 60s/70s rock tunes, to the latest Electro/ Dance / New Wave classics along with the latest Indie Seven Inches!

Thu 25 Jun The Dirty Hearts Club (Lost Knives, DHC DJs) Snafu, 22:01–02:00, £3/2

Steven Milne hosts this weekly electroindisocial that keeps the tight jeans that wee bit tighter. DJs + Live performances

Electric Institute (Krazzy Martin and Talcolm X ) Korova, 23:00–02:00, Free

Weekly electro, house and techno to keep Aberdeen sweaty

Fri 26 Jun Indo Silver Club

The Tunnels, 22:00–03:00, £3

Electro, disco and indie visuals

Mixtape (Giles Walker)

Snafu, 23:00–03:00, £6 after midnight

Weekly club sessions in the dirty side of electronic moosick. Giles Walker resides, most of the time.

Sat 27 Jun Adventures in Stereo (MUMMRA MILNE) Moshulu, 23:00–03:00, £3

Steven Milne lapping up the indieelectro claim. Decent bar prices.

WIN TICKETS TO

T IN THE PARK!

COuRTESy Of TENNENT’S bE CHIllEd If you haven’t got your ticket, just answer this question to be in to win one of two pairs of weekend with camping tickets:

70 THE SKINNY June 2009