Brighton After Dark: 21st May 2013

Bmusic

It seemed as if the streets had melted/It seemed as if the air was scented/I wish all of time could be like this
These evocative lines crop up two-thirds of the way through British Sea Power’s library-rock anthem, ‘Please Stand Up’. A genuinely wonderful song, it has all the requisite arms-in-the-air moments to bring together the soggiest of festival crowds, which is exactly what it’ll be doing at next weekend’s (hopefully not soggy) Meadowlands Festival.

The Brighton-based band will be headlining, and promise to add a litany of memorable moments to a festival that is already an expert in delivering them. An East Sussex stalwart taking place in the rolling grounds of Glynde Place, they have been fulfilling festival fantasies for what seems like forever, and all signs are pointing to this year being no different.

A long-time supporter of the Brighton music scene, this year will see performances from local heroes like Apples and Eve, Clowns and Intercoluter, and just about every other band that has graced a stage in our city. Like any decent festival, however, Meadowlands is about much more than guitars, with a night club, extensive comedy line-up and all the other flags and whistles you expect from a three-day knees up in the countryside It’s even got its own charity casino and pub, called The Silver Fox with an in-house band. Sound good? OF COURSE IT DOES, YOU FOOLS.

As you’d expect, BMusic are going to be there, reporting our cute (our words) little buns off. We can’t wait to speak to some of the awesome bands there and, of course, you the tiddly general public! Come and say hello. And if you want to get the beers in, well that’s just fine with us…
Words: David Hillier

Sade Ali shares her posse’s clubbing attitudes

I’m going to share with you all a bit about my circle of friends and what we get up to when we go out. For some strange reason, a few years ago we decided to nickname ourselves the CFC (I won’t reveal why though!). This group consists of me and two of my best friends Natalie and Nikita. Natalie is the outrageous go getter, who claims herself to be cute; Nikita thinks she’s a pirate and is a bit of a joker, and myself, well let’s just say I’m nearly as weird as Nikita. All three of us share the same weakness: we love going out raving! So our favorite spots are Yates, HedKandi, Smack, Shoosh, The Tube and an occasional Monday at The Volks.

Thursday nights seem to be the craziest for us. Just two Thursdays ago Nikita and Natalie went to a few spots before waking up in a cupboard on West Street (shame I missed that one). The weekend after Shoosh got a lovely visit from the two of them again. Perving on the DJ and doing what they call ‘typical white girl dancing’ they were definitely having a good night. From what I recollect they also had a bit of a dance off, which I don’t think ended in their favour!

Anyway, by the end of this night one had ended up in a hotel still in possesion of her cup of vodka Coke, and the other had made it home and recorded some very embarrassing Keek videos.

Although I missed out on two very funny nights, Bank Holiday Sunday had to be the best. Me and Natalie ventured out to Yates to start off at the foam party. After a few cocktails we then went to see what was going down at Shooshh – all I can say is 1,400 people and house music wasn’t really my scene that night. We decided to go on a hunt for a club that was playing R’n’B…. after trying three different clubs, The Tube saved our night! Walking in we heard our favorite tunes and saw a few familiar faces. We danced terribly, probably had a few too many drinks and finished the night in Buddies restaurant complaining that they got our order wrong. I must admit once I was in the taxi on my way home I was ready for bed but had had another awesome night! Keep an eye out for the CFC’s clubbing antics over the next coming weeks!

>DON’T MISS<

Booty Bakery
The bakery is back with a brand new batch of summer fun for you, with a healthy splash of bass added to some already tasty hip-hop and house. No cooling needed for this hot treat of a night.
Life, Tuesday 21 May, 11pm, Free before midnight, £5/3 after

Groovy Bazaar
Dance the night away while raising money for ActionAid. Groovy Bazaar presents an evening of electronica, glitch, progressive trance and more to help celebrate two Brightonians, who cycled from Istanbul to Bangkok visiting the work of ActionAid projects.
Concorde2, Sunday 26 May, 11pm, £10/7

Mod for it
A British invasion is happening. Some of the best music to arrive on the Mod scene, dance to a fantastic mix of ska, Northern soul, new wave and more from the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s. From resident DJ Jody Lee-Hooker.
Komedia, Saturday 25 May, 11pm, £5/4

Pump Up the Jam
Imagine a whole night devoted to the best house, dance and pop music that the ’90s were honoured to bring you. Two rooms of pure classics, exciting for any original raver or nostalgia junkie.
Coalition, Saturday 25 May, 11pm, from £5

Brighton Noise

Andy Hinton on this week’s best gigs
You would have thought that following the three days of madness, rushing from gig to gig, queueing and sore feet and even sorer heads of The Great Escape that the juggernaut that is the Brighton Live Music scene would slow to a halt temporarily but it rumbles on with a surprising amount of decent gigs this week.

Tuesday sees the experimental duo, Public Service Broadcasting at The Haunt. Their electronic music mixed with samples from British archive footage makes for a stunning musical and visual experience. Supported by Brighton’s own Nordic Giants who similarly accompany their post-rock with a visual spectacular this will be quite a show for those lucky enough to have tickets.

The following night sees a huge gig at Brighton Dome with The Flaming Lips playing as part of the Brighton Festival. This will be another visual spectacular. When I saw them at The Brighton Centre a few years ago it was certainly visually stunning, unfortunately at the expense of the music. Let’s hope there’s more music and less blather.

Thursday and supremely talented New Zealander Princess Chelsea is at The Green Door Store. Her album Lil Golden Book is in her own words “the result of three years holed up in various bedrooms composing and arranging her own aural fairy tale”. It’s intelligent and unique music.

She was someone I fully intended to see at last year’s Great Escape but missed her due to various clashes.

Nice Weather For Airstrikes holds their annual mammoth two days of post-rock and noise-rock bands at The Druids Arms on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Bands this year include Shrine, Monsters Build Mean Robots and Them The Sky. It starts at 6pm on all days and is free. Expect noisy and sweaty fun and don’t forget those earplugs!

Something much more mellow is occurring at The Basement where one of the UK folk scene’s biggest players Chris Wood is playing. His music is thoughtful and powerful and he’s picked up tons of awards for his songwriting over the years.

To round off the Bank Holiday weekend there’s a night of lo-fi psych singer-songwriterness at the Latest Musicbar brought to you by local label Sonic Anhedonic along with Brighton Noise. The artists appearing are Chalk, The Lunchtime Sardine Club and Tobias Hayes.

As usual more information can be found at www.brightonnoise.co.uk