Review : Beards, dreads and mud, Bearded Theory Festival 2014

 Every­thing looks spark­ly and fresh at Beard­ed The­o­ry’s new venue at Cat­ton Hall. The grass is lush, green and springy. The main stage stands at one end of the remark­ably flat new site, with a dance tent and the more inti­mate Tor­na­do Town tent just far enough away to be out of earshot, while a secret stage lies hidden…

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Review: Kurt Vile at St James’s Church

St James’s Church, Pic­cadil­ly, it’s a beau­ti­ful jew­el of a church designed by Christo­pher Wren, and like sev­er­al Lon­don church­es, moon­lights as a music venue. Noth­ing of the Metal­li­ca vari­ety, obvi­ous­ly. We are here to see Kurt Vile do a solo set which is more in keep­ing. Despite its beau­ty, the church’s view­ing expe­ri­ence is only just adequate;…

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Review: Simone Felice at Bush Hall

Simone Felice starts his gig at Bush Hall with New York Times – it’s a haunt­ing and grit­ty num­ber which encap­su­lates famil­iar Felice ter­ri­to­ry – man’s vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty and cru­el­ty, human strug­gle, death. But also love, find­ing beau­ty and joy in life, and the plea­sure and impor­tance of good friends. Of the grit­ti­er sub­ject mat­ter, Felice does­n’t shy away but tack­les things head on, and…

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Animal magic with Blue Zoo, 02 Academy Islington

The 80s – a much maligned decade for music but dig deep and there was plen­ty to enjoy. I’m a fan of my office’s occa­sion­al “Pow­er Bal­lad Thurs­days”. Instead of a sea of hunched com­put­er nerds nod­ding along to their own pri­vate world via their head­phones, we’re all shar­ing the moment as Africa by Toto and Urgent by For­eign­er blast out…

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Review: The See See – psychedelia with attitude at The Lexington

The See See were part of a swirly psy­che­delia night at The Lex­ing­ton on Pen­tonville Road two years ago, and they par­tic­u­lar­ly caught my atten­tion. (Also mem­o­rable were Cana­di­an band Ele­phant Stone whose music is enriched with Rishi Dhir’s mes­meris­ing sitar play­ing). Fast for­ward two years and we were back at The Lex­ing­ton last week for The…

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Review: Courtney Barnett at ACE hotel, Shoreditch

The Aussie-accen­t­ed, coun­try-tinged tones of Court­ney Bar­net­t’s songs have been float­ing over the Radio 6 music air­waves of late. Last Thurs­day was her sec­ond Lon­don appear­ance, this time at Ace Hotel, Shored­itch. Court­ney takes keeps things min­i­mal, walk­ing on stage to plug all the leads in before she’s joined by her bass play­er and drum­mer. With no…

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The Earl Haig Hall revival in Crouch End: music and more

UPDATE 2019: Earl Haig Hall has now closed. Antic sold it on, it is now board­ed up and its future is under review. Lat­est plans are for the build­ing to become a chil­dren’s nurs­ery. I will keep this post here as a mem­o­ry of what was a much-need­ed and loved com­mu­ni­ty bar/restaurant and venue for…

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Focus on folk music: Pete Seeger; Inside Llewyn Davis

There is a cer­tain poignan­cy to the death this week of the great folk hero Pete Seeger, the singer and song­writer of protest songs who helped define the folk music land­scape of the last cen­tu­ry. There are sev­er­al of his com­po­si­tions that I remem­ber from my child­hood and they feel like tra­di­tion­al songs passed down through…

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The Orb 25th Anniversary, The Trades Hebden Bridge

The Trades in Heb­den Bridge I decid­ed would be the right place to expe­ri­ence The Orb for their 25th Anniver­sary Show. It felt appro­pri­ate to be some­where inti­mate and imme­di­ate, friend­ly and just a bit off the wall. The Orb are sched­uled to play near me at The Forum in Ken­tish Town, which is a…

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Review: 3 Daft Monkeys at the Half Moon, Putney

While some peo­ple play air gui­tar, I con­fess to air vio­lin moments. Ide­al mate­r­i­al for this innocu­ous pas­time: The Lev­ellers, Peat­bog Faeries, and Cor­nish trio 3 Daft Mon­keys. I first dis­cov­ered them at Tow­ersey in 2011, fol­lowed by an autumn gig at the Half Moon pub in Put­ney. And here they are back again, two…

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