Shh quiet music festival
Feb 1

Review: SHHH quiet music festival in Hampstead

As far as fes­ti­vals are con­cerned, win­ter is the new sum­mer.  Take SHHH Qui­et music fes­ti­val organ­ised by The Local.TV and visu­al artist Luke Drozd – a musi­cal feast last­ing from noon to near­ly mid­night, in a cosy church in north Lon­don. SHHH is now in it’s 8th year, with much involve­ment from music pro­mot­er and…

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Mark Lanegan at 02 Shepherds Bush
Jan 29

Mark Lanegan at 02 Shepherd’s Bush Empire: invisible in the gloom

With each album and with each col­lab­o­ra­tion, Mark Lane­gan’s star ascends anoth­er notch into the fir­ma­ment. He’s a man with an impec­ca­ble rock back­sto­ry, Amer­i­can bad boy incar­nate, equal­ly at home as a char­ac­ter from Butcher’s Cross­ing to Twin Peaks; his is a world seen from the wrong side of the tracks. His voice is raspy, capa­ble of wistfulness…

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Jimi Goodwin at The Trades
Jan 25

Heavenly celebrate at The Trades Club: Jimi Goodwin; Kid Wave

REPOSTING FROM 2015! Heav­en­ly Records are cel­e­brat­ing their 25th anniver­sary by tak­ing over the Trades Club for the week­end with a packed pro­gramme of shows. In order to cram it all in, they’re adding mati­nee per­for­mances as well as the usu­al evening ones. It feels slight­ly odd and indul­gent to leave the snow, busy shops and cafes…

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Lost in the dream
Dec 31

Top albums of 2014… and the vinyl surge continues

Year 2013 saw David Bowie and Daft Punk cre­at­ing a buzz with their new albums, mak­ing the world sit up and lis­ten. In 2014, things all seem a bit more low key – well, maybe apart from Pink Floy­d’s The End­less Riv­er. It’s been more a case of hav­ing to go and seek out for your­self what’s around. There’s a…

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Dec 22

Alabama 3 back in Brixton for a homecoming show

Alaba­ma 3 had plen­ty to cel­e­brate last Sat­ur­day night. The band were sched­uled to play the final gig of their 2014 tour back on their home turf in Brix­ton, at the Elec­tric. Then, for those of hardy con­sti­tu­tion, there’s the after par­ty at Brix­ton Jamm. For some rea­son, Alaba­ma 3 have always stayed slight­ly under the radar. Not…

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Firestations band play live
Dec 9

Album launch for Firestations is literally a piss-up in a brewery

There’s noth­ing Gourmet Gigs likes more than a com­bi­na­tion of music accom­pa­nied by inter­est­ing culi­nary or alco­holic refresh­ment. Last Tues­day offered such an occa­sion, with the added mys­tery of a loca­tion in the heart of an indus­tri­al estate in Waltham­stow. Just to rewind: The End fes­ti­val in Crouch End two weeks pre­vi­ous­ly had fea­tured a band called Firesta­tions, who caught the…

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Nov 14

The Asteroids Galaxy Tour at Oslo, Hackney

Oslo, the new(ish) restau­rant, bar and music venue is one of the lat­est new des­ti­na­tions after the avalanche of clo­sures of grimy, char­ac­ter­ful music venues in north, west and cen­tral Lon­don over the past few years. (Actu­al­ly, make that coun­try­wide, with Liv­er­pool cur­rent­ly under­go­ing self­same prob­lems). So it’s been heart­en­ing to see a new wave of well-thought out, spruced up venues…

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Northern Soul the film
Oct 23

Northern Soul – the film

“I’ve nev­er seen so many weak blad­ders,” said my part­ner, as yet anoth­er sil­hou­ette shuf­fled out, block­ing the screen dur­ing North­ern Soul, the film by Elaine Con­stan­tine. “It’s because every­one here is ‘of a cer­tain age’ ”, I replied. Indeed, about 90 per cent of the audi­ence did look as if they could remem­ber North­ern Soul,…

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