Brighton after dark: 16 July 2013

Bmusic

Man Machine/pseudo human being, Man Machine/super human being
In 1978 Kraftwerk released the album The Man-Machine, shepherding you into a future that finally arrived on 26 June 2013. So whilst Skynet has yet to go off and man still toys with the ideas of creating a lightsaber, Yoichiro Kawaguchi offers you Z-machines, the world’s first Robotic Music Band, an all robot trio, that on this date played their first live debut performance in Tokyo.
Hold on to your futures.

Supervised Japanese artists and creators have developed Z-Machines to realise the cutting edge party scene. 78 fingers, 12 picks, 3 bots. The robotic trio are Mach on guitar, Ashura on percussion and Cosmo on keyboard. Together they play and make noise like a new age set of hippy terminators with a love for thrash metal and guitar trawling synthbeats, revealing that robots can do heavy metal just as well as Japanese pop.

They played alongside human pop duo Amoyamo teasing the idea that both robots and humans can be coaxed into acting together more fluidly. It’s as if we are seeing two species suddenly merge or the younger and older generations suddenly sort their differences out, we have a counterpart, Terminator was a horror don’t you know, Robots are like dogs but human, right? You know, like our best friends?! It wasn’t long before we in the Bmusic office began naming and talking to all our electronic devices.

Creator Kawaguchi dreams of sending his android protégés to other planets to perform. Here on Earth, though, robots already have a rich musical history – both for the sake of entertainment and for exploring the boundaries between humans and machines.

Unsurprisingly Z-machines comes across way less manufactured than One Direction; and whilst it’s easy to draw similarities between the produced pop puppets and puppeteers of The X Factor, what’s on offer here is a band that will turn up on time and has a lot more of their own personality to show. Oh, and they’re also pretty interesting.
Give them a listen whilst waiting for your lightsaber.

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Words: Ben Darling

Sade Ali’s promoting the art of promoting

This week I’m going to give you an insider’s look at the life of a promoter. Yes, a promoter, those mildly irritating people that stand on the streets waving flyers in your face trying to convince you to go to their club! I am one of these people. Although I get a lot of comments such as ‘get a real job’ and ‘do you even get paid for this?’, I love promoting. Promoting actually pays very well (I know the minimum for a promoting role to be as much as £8/hr. Being a promoter also has its perks; you tend to meet a lot of the other promoters in Brighton and will more than likely never pay entry to a club again. Promoters are also the funniest, most interesting people ever (hence the fact they’re promoters).

Most people who walk past promoters will not take the flyer purely because they think promoters are paid by commission; they couldn’t be more wrong. Promoters are purely there to inform you of what is happening at their club, offer you deals or offer to escort you to the venue. They are normal people and, like everyone else, they will probably be raving with you in the club after work, so cut them some slack, listen to them and take advantage of the deals rather than ignoring them. They have to deal with drunk people all night, the rude, the funny, and the random emotional one. Apart from the few little annoying factors, plus the weather in the winter, being a promoter is the best job I have ever done! You get paid a lot more than some do, to stand and talk to people, have fun and party.

A few things a promoter would have seen or heard:
• A break-up (normally a screaming fight during the break-up)
• Sex on the beach, or a male and female on their way to the beach (we know what you’re doing!)
• A fight (some bigger than others, normally with a huge audience)
• A stag do complaining they can’t get in anywhere
• A group of boys from London complaining they can’t get in anywhere
• A drunk person who has lost all their friends so they stand and talk to you for an hour!
• Hearing the line: “I’ll go to your club if I get free entry”
• Someone asking if the celeb on the flyer is actually going to be there
• A competition of who can throw their flyers the furthest
• Getting asked for your number
• Someone getting arrested or taken home in an ambulance
• Underage people asking you to get them into the club (by the way, we’re not going to do it).

Wasted Years
Whether you want to celebrate the music of your youth from the ‘80s and ‘90s or you’re just young enough not to remember the now recycled ‘retro’ tunes you like, then Wasted Years is a night you must certainly attend.
Pavilion Tavern, Tuesday 16 July, 10.30pm, £3/2 4/4

Weekdays are for dancing too, you know. Let DJ Mike Diver take you down into the depths of some commercial and obscure tunes, ready to make your feet move in a lead up to the weekend.
Green Door Store, Thursday 18 July, 11pm, Free

Born Bad
Spend your Friday night at one of the best club nights in Brighton.
A raucous night of rockabilly and ’50s rock ’n’ roll wild enough to start your weekend with a boppin’ bang.
Komedia, Friday 19 July, 11pm, £6/5, 18+ only

Club Criminal
Remember the days when rock and indie music used to rule the charts? So does Club Criminal. Get ready for a messy night of classic rock and indie spread over two floors, perfect for drowning out your work day.
Latest Musicbar, Thursday 18 July, 9pm, £3/2

Brighton noise

Andy Hinton on this week’s best gigs
After mentioning my hatred of talking at gigs a few weeks ago I’ve decided to expand on this with a series on our site on Gig Etiquette. My first full-scale rant is on that particular annoyance. Check out the article and we’d welcome any anecdotes on the subject on our Facebook page. What, you don’t yet ‘like’ our Facebook page? Well go to www.facebook.com/brightonnoise to keep up with all the latest gig news.

Tuesday: the rather brilliantly named Com Truise is at The Green Door Store. His electronic music is summed up by Alastair Reid; “Every track is an epic synth odyssey that would befit a Blade Runner opium den”.

Last year they were hyped to a ridiculous extent. New York hipsters Friends are at Coalition and will pack a punch. They’re supported by one of this year’s Great Escape names, No Ceremony//.

The biggest (and loudest) gig of the night will be Canada’s Japandroids at The Haunt. A two piece, their punky noise-pop is very popular with many of the Brighton Noise crew and they are supported by Brighton’s band on the up, The Wytches.

There’s nothing that really stands out until the weekend unless you count crusty heroes (and apparently Brighton’s most successful band ever) The Levellers on Friday. Permanent fixtures at every free festival when I was at Uni (and now at the Dome;) I wonder if their encore will be ‘Battle Of The Beanfield’?

Saturday night and there are again three gigs of note. I don’t know if anyone else has noticed but there is definitely a grunge revival going on. Leeds lads Dinosaur Pile Up are of the new breed and are playing at The Hope. San Francisco’s Two Gallants have been plying their trade for a good few years and, after a hiatus, are back with an album that packs a grungetastic punch. They are at Sticky Mike’s.

Akron/Family at The Haunt are a different proposition entirely. Our writer Sarah sums them up: “Their sound revolves around a jam-band ideology that cleverly draws together a sound richly-textured by multi-genre influences, from the aforementioned folk and indie to smoky jazz, experimental rock, grunge and electronica”.
On Monday rising Brighton stars (via Melbourne) Kins are at The Green Door Store.
More info at www.brightonnoise.co.uk