Seth and I are playing a duo set at the Horse Improv Club, IKLECTIK ARTLAB tonight. Swing by if you’re in the area…
I love their flyers.
Sloth Racket is taking to the road in early May to celebrate the release of our album ‘Triptych’ (released 2nd May on our new Luminous label). We’ll be playing around the UK with support from Arts Council England. Can’t wait! See you out there…
It’s been an admin-heavy February, with a lot of preparations for the forthcoming Sloth Racket album release and tour plus some heavy doses of LUME admin too. I’m happy to say though that I’ll be emerging from hibernation in March! A few nice gigs coming up:
On the 15th March Colin Webster and I have been invited to guest with Far Rainbow at Zero Wave Club (The Fiddler’s Elbow, Kentish Town). We’re billed as duelling saxophonists on the FB event…uh oh! This is part of a really nice multi-band bill – check out the flyer below.
On 3rd April I’ll be playing trio with Olie Brice and Corey Mwamba, on the other side of the bill from Dave Kane Quartet at one of our LUME Vortex gigs. Looking forward to this, and the more organised among you can buy tickets for it already.
The last gig I want to mention here is a special one. On 16th April Madwort Sax Quartet are recording our debut album live at LUME! This is happening at Hundred Years Gallery, which is a lovely space. It’s going to be ace to finally record an album with the quartet, which has been playing Tom’s music since 2012. Tickets will be on sale for this soon too.
All in all, a nice couple of months – see you out there!
I’ve had a bunch of video footage from Sloth Racket gigs (thanks Anton!) kicking around for a while, but haven’t had a chance to do anything with it. Now, finally, I’ve posted the first video up online, from our gig at LUME (when we were still at Long White Cloud) in April.
Also hidden in the depths of my computer was this cool poster from our gig at the Kazimier Garden in Liverpool in July. It was a great gig with a lovely crowd, and we were really well looked after by Joel the organiser and DJ. I don’t know who designed the poster, but I love this frog!
I have a couple of nice gigs coming up this week. First of all, Word Of Moth is reappearing on Friday 30th October at I’klectik Artlab near Waterloo. Olie Brice has invited us to share the bill with his quartet, and we’ll have special guest James Opstad on bass. This will be my first time playing at I’klectik, so I’m looking forward to checking out the space…
The second gig is our next LUME night at the Vortex, on Sunday 1st November. I’m playing a trio set with Seth Bennett and Andrew Lisle. This has never happened before! Pretty excited about it. Also on the bill is a duo of Tom Taylor and Rob Luft, who I haven’t heard play together, so it will be cool to hear them. If you’re free, come along and join us for a night of improvised music. Here’s the poster (in its two forms!)…
Quick post about an exciting week coming up. Firstly, we’re releasing a compilation album called ‘Live At LUME’ to raise money for future LUME activities. All the tracks are recordings made at LUME gigs and donated by the artists. Alex Bonney also donated his time to tidy up and master the album – so although they’re bootlegs, they sound really great! Have a listen below and grab your copy from the Bandcamp page. It was another great excuse for me to do some linocut printmaking too – so there’s a handmade CD edition…
Also happening this week is LUME’s 2nd birthday party/gig! We’re decamping to Hundred Years Gallery on Thursday 9th July for a night of improvised music with a difference. See the (also handmade and involving linocut printmaking) flyer below…
I just got back from a great trip to Paris, as part of a collaboration between artists from Efpi Records and Onze Heures Onze Collective. It was organised by Jazz North, and this was the first leg of the exchange. Anton Hunter Trio, Ben Cottrell from Efpi and I travelled down to meet Julien Pontvianne and Alexandre Herer from OHO and play together. We had a nice session playing a combination of improvised music and some composed material that we’d all brought along, and then the following evening Anton’s trio played a set as part of Festival Onze Heures Onze.
It was a really interesting and inspiring few days, and I look forward to the second leg of the trip! This will be in August, when the OHO musicians will travel to the UK to perform with us at the Manchester Jazz Festival (where I will also be playing with Madwort Sax Quartet on the same day).
Comedy group shot…(photo by Stephanie Knibbe)
While we were in Paris, Anton and I managed to squeeze in a Ripsaw Catfish gig at Plateforme, a fantastic arts space run by another collective. This was made possible by Anton Mobin, who we met earlier this year when we shared the bill with him and Benedict Taylor at a Raw Tonk Records night. We had a great time: the gig was absolutely packed with an enthusiastic listening audience, and we were part of an eclectic programme with Crash Duo (Anton Mobin and Ayato) and Mariachi (aka the solo guitar project of Nina Garcia). Massive thanks to Anton M for making this happen: it was brilliant to be able to take advantage of our time in Paris with an extra date!
This was possibly my first proper gig outside the UK and it was ace. Here’s to more music further afield in the future!