Brighton afetr dark: 15 Ocober 2013
Bmusic
London Grammar teach us all how to dance
This Wednesday sees London Grammar take to the stage at Concorde 2: the chances are if you read this page then you will be familiar with the trio who recently hit Number 2 with their debut album, If You Wait.
With the likes of Disclosure, James Blake and Rudimental, they form a scene that burst out of post-dubstep, neo-dubstep, future-dubstep (and, hey, even just plain old dubstep). It is a movement that is putting intelligent dance music at the forefront of people’s minds and in the charts in a way that hasn’t happened since the mid-’90s trip-hop explosion. Back then we were all revelling in the smokey, stoner beats of Massive Attack and Portishead. In many ways Grammar, Disclosure and co are their spiritual descendants, weaving together songs that an audience can either have a rave to, or just nod their heads.
If you watched any festival coverage over the summer you would have seen that it was these bands that got the crowds bouncing. It might have seemed a bit like 2003 with the like of Arctic Monkeys, Franz Ferdinand Bloc Party and Kings Of Leon all releasing albums, but in the fields it was all 2013.
This is something we should embrace: like sport, music moves in waves. A movement like punk or acid-house (or trip-hop) might still be talked about in halcyon terms, and still embraced by new artists every year. But it can only ever stay truly relevant, truly at the apex of the commercial and critical cutting edge for so long. This may not sit with the nostalgic among us, but it should be embraced because it means music is continually moving forward, terminally striving to discover the next London Grammar.
Bmusic have fortnightly meetings, and we are always looking for great, young (or old) talent to come onboard the good ship B. If you have a bag of ideas and a flair for the unexpected we’d love to see you there. Please check the Facebook for details- www.facebook.com/Bmusic
Twitter @Bmusic_TV
Youtube.com/thisisBmusic
Words: David Hillier
Sade Ali hopes for some Cashback at The Haunt
Cashback: an “incentive” offered by companies where they offer you what you think would be free money when it’s actually just money out of your own bank account. Cashback is frequently a ploy used to make you spend more than what you originally intended. Well, a bit of good news for you… The geniuses over at Dot Dot Dot promotions launched a brand new night at The Haunt a few weeks back. The night is called ‘CA$HBACK’. But the difference being, you actually have a chance to get your cash back! Every Wednesday they give you a chance to win huge amounts of money. This is how it works:
Step ➊: You pay £3 entry and they give you a raffle ticket.
Step ➋: They put £1 from every entry fee into a pot.
Step ➌: They raffle off the entire pot.
The more people in the club the bigger the pot! £300, £400, £500+!
They even give you one of those giant cheques if you win – what a great bit of memorabilia. The music policy isn’t too bad either: real hip-hop all night long with a few other genres chucked in when appropriate. And when are you ever going to turn down £2.50 drinks? (Yes, that does include Jagerbombs.) So, if you have ever been to B**tard Pop at Audio or Branded at Funfair then you’ll know exactly what to expect – nonstop bangers, a feel good vibe and ridiculous amounts of Jager being consumed! If you haven’t been to any of these nights, I seriously suggest you do. They’re made more for the alternative crowd rather than chart-followers, but the current top hits are thrown in there too. So if you wore Vans and Converse before it was a high street trend, beanie hats before they were a girls’ accessory and still think friendship bracelets look ‘sick’ then these are the perfect nights for you!
ARTWORK BY: Jamie O’Mara (dotdotdotpromotions.com)
PHOTOGRAPHY BY: Olie Raven (worldofraven.squarespace.com/)
Twitter @SadeAli
>Don’t Miss<
Wonder Yeahs
Could you find it in yourself to travel back to the ’90s? No worries, because this is one club night that will do it all for you. Great tunes from that decade plus some novelty ’90s video games and skating visuals.
The Haunt, Fri 18 Oct, 11pm, £3
Coco Loco
It’s not quite Friday but celebrate the countdown to your weekend at Coco Loco, Coalition’s Wednesday club night. Combining the best of the UK chart with other boppin’ genres of music and cheap drinks all night long.
Coalition, Wed 16 Oct, 10.30pm, £1/£3
Slap It On Tuesdays
So it’s Tuesday, you’ve started a hardworking week and yes, of course you should get what you want. Luckily The North Laine will play your favourite tunes all night long. Make sure you tell them though, they’re not psychic you know!
North Laine, Tues 15 Oct, 6pm, Free
Tea & Biscuits
Jazz up and get over your midweek working blues with a funky, soul-filled, swinging night down at The Fishbowl. Pretend it’s the 1950s and shake those hips to some proper old school R’n’B, psyche and more.
The Fishbowl, Wed 16 Oct,
10pm, Free
Brighton Noise
Alastair Reid on this week’s best gigs
Hi all. Let’s get down to business… Thursday has the picks of the week, starting with Islet at The Hope. In 2010 I wandered up to The Hope’s upstairs venue after being pestered constantly by a friend to see some new Welsh band that were meant to be doing exciting things. Forgive me, but contemporary Welsh music brings up uncomfortable memories of Catatonia’s Cerys Matthews braying about Mulder and Scully like a Caernarfon landlady doing drunken karaoke or MTV videos from Lostprophets and Funeral For A Friend throwing dollars out of Cadillacs when failing to crack America. That and Charlotte Church. The exception that proves the rule is the Manic Street Preachers’ Holy Bible, still brilliant today, but by and large the Welsh musical output of my lifetime has been forgettable. Which is why Islet stand out so much; the four-piece make music of such striking originality and passion. They each have a preferred instrument but will swap and change with each other throughout the set, sharing vocal duties and flitting around the stage to a thumping, primal trance-inducing rhythms. I left with two of their records under my arm.
Just down the road, Dan Le Sac VS Scroobius Pip will be exorcising their respective demons of beat wizardry and blabbermouth at Komedia. Rather than rap about the size of their gun rack or a burgeoning career at Her Majesty’s Pleasure these two treat hip-hop as an art, a feat that is too often forgotten in modern culture, that few attempt and fewer succeed in. Taken to its core, hip-hop music is produced beats and performance poetry, two of the four elements coined by Afrika Bambaataa in ’70s South Bronx. That’s how he defined the fledgling subculture and that’s what Le Sac and Pip religiously ascribe to. Case in point: on 2011’s ‘Thou Shalt Always Kill’ the Pip spells it out: “thou shalt remember that guns, bitches and bling were never part of the four elements and never will be”, followed by their mantra: “thou shalt not make repetitive generic music”.
If you’re still looking for more, George Smale’s Ancient Times will be celebrating the launch of their The Smith’s inspired double A-side single at The Blind Tiger on Friday. Oh, and it’s my birthday. So there’s that.
Twitter @BrightonNoise
