Portions For Foxes Promotions

Ghostpoet @ The Cluny, Newcastle 27th February

2012-01-05T03:51:00.000-08:00

portions for foxes presents:
GHOSTPOET
+ Alt J

@ The Cluny, Newcastle
27th February

Tickets £12 from RPM, Beatdown stores
PLEASE BUY FROM LOCAL RECORD STORES!

or click the following:
GHOSTPOET CLUNY TICKETS

Born and raised somewhere between London, Coventry, Nigeria and Dominica, Obaro admits that his heritage is important to him, but that it hasn’t consciously affected his musical career: “My parents enjoyed listening to music around the house but never really encouraged it as a career. I kind of pursued listening to various sounds late into the night when the house was asleep.” And as for attempting to pinpoint his tastes… it’s hard to gauge when his palette flips from Badly Drawn Boy’s ‘The Hour Of The Bewilderbeast’ (the first CD he ever bought) to the angular dynamics of the UK grime scene via Iggy Pop, Fela Kuti, Radiohead, MF Doom and Squarepusher. This was the music that captured his imagination at university, where Obaro was part of a grime collective: “One of the guys made the beats with Reason, he taught me the basics and I kind of stumbled, bumbled and fumbled my way to the present.”

The 'present' Obaro talks about? a Mercury Prize nomination in 2011 and widespread celebration of his debut as the most nuanced, original and characterful debut in hip hop since Original Pirate Material.

TICKETS £12 advance:
TICKETS FOR GHOSTPOET @ THE CLUNY NEWCASTLE

PHOTOS OF GHOSTPOET:

please email portions for foxes promo 'at' gmail dot com for hi-res

PRESS:

"Rarely does a British debut album forge such a fully formed, genuinely unique direction that attempts to slot it into established scenes prove almost entirely fruitless. You probably have to go back to Original Pirate Material, in fact, for similar impact." BBC

Ghostpoet (aka Obaro Ejimiwe) fresh outta the West Midlands, has been making a serious dent on the live circuit this summer thanks to his storytelling skills. if you don’t know about his suave Brit-hop style already, get involved. - Mixmag 5/5

“With lullabies to hypnotise, this somnolent spirit is sleepwalking his way to greatness”
The Guardian

“A mix between Mos Def’s halfhearted croon and Tunde Adebimpe [lead singer of TV On The Radio] on quaaludes”.
Patric Fallon, XLR8R

“(A voice that is) idiosyncratic. It has a quality of it’s own. Languid, laidback, pensive, wise and broken. Sad but hopeful at the same time.” Nobodydancenomore

North East East Africa Famine Benefit CD

2011-09-22T12:23:00.001-07:00

Hi All,

In case you've missed it, we've been involved in curating a CD of North East bands (oh and Willy Mason) to sell to benefit the DEC East Africa Famine Appeal.

click to read more and buy:
North East East Africa Famine Charity CD

You can download tracks individually for £1 each, or buy the full CD with it's wonderful art by our resident poster designer Kerry Hyndman.

The CD features:
Futureheads, Willy Mason, Field Music, Shields, Age of Consent, Knuckle Dragger, The Lake Poets, Vinyl Jacket, Lanterns On the Lake, Maximo Park's Paul Smith, Here Comes Good Sailing, Young Liar, Symphonic Pictures, Warm Digits, We Are Knuckle Dragger, Let's Buy Happiness, Mammal Club and Waskerley Way.

Pretty much a who's who of sweet bands around here. Oh and one of my favourite songwriter's ever Willy Mason.

Don't screw up by ignoring it.

Spectrals @ The Cumberland Arms, Newcastle, October 14th

2011-09-01T02:45:00.000-07:00

Portions For Foxes & Splash One are proud to present...

SPECTRALS (Leeds - Wichita Records)
+CULT IMAGE+FANTASY RAINBOW

THE CUMBERLAND ARMS

FRIDAY OCTOBER 14th

BUY TICKETS FOR SPECTRALS AT THE CUMBERLAND ARMS, NEWCASTLE

"Spectrals, aka 21 year old Louis Jones, has signed to Wichita for the release of his debut album.

'Bad Penny' is due for release on 17th October, featuring eleven new songs - none of which have appeared on previous releases."

Bringing their brand of dozy surf pop to Newcastle for the first time, we can't wait to welcome Spectrals to the Cumberland Arms in October

HI RES PHOTOS:
visit Spectral's website

Jeffrey Lewis + support @ The Cluny, Newcastle October 24th

2011-09-01T02:37:00.000-07:00

portions for foxes presents:

JEFFREY LEWIS
+ very special guests
@ The Cluny, Byker
Monday October 24th

Tickets £10 advance;
BUY TICKETS FOR JEFFREY LEWIS AT THE CLUNY, NEWCASTLE

We are so stoked to have Jeff and his band back for the first time since our show in 2007.

If you haven't seen him before you may appreciably wonder why Jeff is practically a household name among indie rock fans of every stripe; his band's live show with Modern Lovers style rawk, strummy anti folk and illustrated storytelling are totally unique, inspiring and characterful and this tour for the new record A Turn In The Dream Songs is the best chance in the universe to check it out.

the initiated can sweat out the excitement for new Fuff and incredibly literate and witty new tunes, from someone who's been caught up touring lectures on Watchmen and writing songwriting guides for The New York Times.

PRESS:

"Weird? Very... but also downright inspiring" **** - Rolling Stone

“[Jeffrey Lewis is] The best lyricist working in the US today.” - Jarvis Cocker (Pulp)

“The Big Apple’s best-kept secret.... Genius-gone-ignored… mind-blowing." - NME

"Bizarre but brilliant" - Uncut

"Hands down my favorite contemporary songwriter" - Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie)

“All my favorite songwriters are American – Jad Fair, Jonathan Richman and Jeffrey Lewis.” - Eddie Argos (Art Brut), Time Out New York

"At his best, [Lewis is] a vulnerable master of the humorously ineffable" - Robert Christgau

"Dazzling" - Mojo

HI RES PHOTOS:
email portions for foxes promo 'at' gmail dot com for photos

JEFFREY WEBSITE (WITH BIO)
Jeffrey Lewis' Website

Battles Newcastle Gateshead Town Hall Tickets

2011-07-20T06:19:00.001-07:00

To those coming straight through google who want tickets to see battles at gateshead town hall, you can buy tickets here:

Battles Gateshead Town Hall Tickets.

portions on facebook/ twitter

2011-07-05T03:03:00.000-07:00

Join our facebook group here, hear first about the shows coming up, and any special one off events.

Portions For Foxes Promotions Facebook Page

Read our tweets here.
Portions For Foxes Twitter Page
or @prrrtions4foxes

Battles @ Gateshead Old Town Hall November 17th

2011-06-29T03:52:00.000-07:00

portions for foxes presents:

BATTLES
+ support
@ Gateshead Old Town Hall
17th November.

TICKETS:
Tickets £15 adv. from RPM, Beatdown Records,
and online here:

BLURB:
Battles play the incredible surroundings of Gateshead Old Town Hall on November 17th.

“When you see a band you really like, the reason you really like them is because you wish you’d had that idea. And when I saw Battles I thought, “Damn! Why didn’t I think of that?” Battles fan Brian Eno

You can often spot the best bands - the truly once-in-a-generation type - by their names alone. The all time greats usually come ready made with nomenclature that encapsulates their sound and ethos effortlessly. BATTLES are no exception. They are a rock group locked in conflict with the very limitations of what it means to be a rock group; conducting an all out assault on mediocrity and waging a fearsome campaign against genre conventions and pigeonholes. Their sound is that of an elite guard engaging in a series of complex sonic skirmishes. This is the sublime noise of equally talented musicians pushed to their limit - as interested in conducting synchronized audio attacks and ambushes on the listener as they are on each other.

IMAGES:
Download Hi res album art for Battles in Gateshead here

for more pictures and questions email portions for foxes promo at gmail dot com

Emmy The Great @ The Cluny, September 19th

2011-06-27T09:35:00.000-07:00

portions for foxes presents:

EMMY THE GREAT
plus support
@ Newcastle, Cluny
September 19th

TICKETS:
Tickets from RPM Records, Beatdown Records, Cluny and here:
http://www.wegottickets.com/event/124330

INFO:
Emmy the Great is both a solo and collaborative project. Based around the words and music of singer-songwriter Emma-Lee Moss, it developed sonically with Euan Hinshelwood, guitarist in East London's Younghusband. The two are often joined by a a collective of musicians including Tom Rogerson of Three Trapped Tigers, Jenny Lau of the Mules, Ric Hollingbery of Pengilly's and Younghusband members Pete Baker and Joe Chilton.

The band's second album, Virtue, will be released in 2011. Mixing themes from myths, fairy tales and saints' lives, using the voices of archetypal female protagonists, and mixing classical images with the modern industrial images that have replaced them, the album started out as a purely third person project, but took on a personal tinge when Emma got caught up in her fiance's sudden religious conversion and the break-up of their relationship. The album was recorded very quickly after the summer of her cancelled wedding, with chief bridesmaid Euan, and legendary producer Gareth Jones (Depeche Mode, Grizzly Bear, These New Puritans).

CONTACT:

portions for foxes promo 'at' gmail dot com for hi res images

REVIEWS:

Mojo **** Uncut **** Financial Times **** Manchester Evening News ***** The Fly **** Telegraph ****

The Times **** Vice Magazine 8/10 Hi-fi News 9.4/10 Drowned in Sound 8/ 10

"Resigned but never accusatory, it makes for poignant reassurance that sometimes feeling utterly bewildered and lost is not only natural, but a strange and unmistakeable cause for optimism." - BBC

"One of the boldest young writers in pop today." - The Guardian

"Ambitious, thoughtful, outright feminist pop." - the Mirror (***)

"She's starting to develop a lyrical mysticism that's direct, human and fascinating." - The Arts Desk

"What folk music has been praying for" - Evening Standard

The Low Anthem @ Gateshead Old Town Hall August 16th

2011-06-27T09:28:00.000-07:00

portions for foxes presents;

THE LOW ANTHEM
@ Gateshead Old
Old Town Hall
August 16th
Tickets £15 advance (see below)

The Low Anthem play the beautiful Town Hall in Gateshead on this one off show August 16th. From its hand silkscreened cover art to its meticulously crafted songs, The Low Anthem offers work meant to be held, savored, contemplated, and occasionally stomped along to.

The Providence, RI, trio’s massively acclaimed debut 'OH My God, CHarlie Darwin' offers a distinctly human touch in an era of instant uploading and ephemeral expression. The mood of Oh My God, Charlie Darwin is melancholic from the start—quiet, intimate, full of longing, and often hauntingly beautiful. In its lyrics, a dog-eat-dog society is nearing collapse and relationships are bruised, broken, or irretrievably lost. Yet in their tenor there is a pencil shaving of hope.

"A fine mix of hymnal purity and barn-storming rock" 4/5 Uncut

"the songs of Oh My God, Charlie Darwin infuse you with familiarity like an embroidered pillow on an old porch that says ‘home sweet home’.
Drowned in Sound 8/10

WHERE IS THE TOWN HALL?
Read about the town hall here

TICKETS:
Tickets are £15 Advance. Available at RPM Records, Beatdown Records and here:
LOW ANTHEM GATESHEAD TOWN HALL TICKETS

Doors at 8pm

James Vincent Mcmorrow @ The Cluny, Newcastle

2011-03-04T11:15:00.001-08:00

JAMES VINCENT MCMORROW @ THE CLUNY, NEWCASTLE

Conceived and written in a 5 month period in a house by the Irish seaside, JVMcM's debut LP 'Early in the morning' has been hailed in his homeland as "one of the first truly great albums of the decade" (The Dubliner), before receiving a torrent of acclaim upon its release here.

...The record showcases a fragile, falsetto voice breathing intricate melodic lines and harmonies that are lyrically infatuated with the whistful and mournful.

The rustic arrangements of chords and vocal vanish and return like the ebbing and flowing of a river through cold autumn woodland.

Since 2010 James has earned an American contract with Vagrant and early comparisons to Justin Vernon and Crosby Stills and Nash. Though in the dreamy falsetto vocals, and the fact that everything involved was written and performed by one person, 'Early in the Morning' has a flavour and posture entirely its own.

SOME REVIEWS:
Sounds both fresh and as if they’ve been in your head forever…McMorrow’s debut deserves its success” Q, ****

“A captivating debut…An arresting journey from emotional trials to aural pleasure” Uncut, ****

“Vocals, lyrics and arrangements whose restraint and subtletly are totally at odds with the profound impact and resonance of his songs' Sunday Times Culture, Breaking Act

“Gorgeous…a similar beauty to James Blake’s current hit” NME

“Haunting, atmospheric…wintry wistfulness” Guardian

TICKETS ARE £8.50 Advance.
BUY TICKETS FOR JAMES VINCENT MCMORROW AT THE CLUNY, NEWCASTLE HERE

PHOTOS:
For hi-res photos of James Vincent Mcmorrow to accompany your article, post, or preview
Click here (under 'downloads')

LISTEN:
Some Videos of James Vincent Mcmorrow on Youtube.

any questions email portions for foxes promo at gmail .com

Willy Mason @ The Cluny, 19th May

2011-01-28T03:25:00.000-08:00

Willy Mason is best known for his top 30 single 'Oxygen', which precipitated a UK tour in support of Radiohead, and the album 'Where The Humans Eat', written when he was just a teenager, but showcasing an incredible level of wisdom and piercing emotional insight. His most recent album 'If The Ocean Gets Rough' has been supplemented by scores of songs released online and self released tour E.P.s distributed at shows with the likes of Mark Lanegan and Isobell Campbell.

He has been called 'the next generation of Americana' by Uncut, and his UK shows are notorious for involving huge sing alongs, playing to people that know every word of his impassioned and uplifting take on the American songbook. Then there's his voice; timeless as an oak-tree and warm as a bonfire.

Last September he played a tiny show in newcastle Portions for Foxes organised with the help of Architecture. It was one of the best we've ever hosted and we can't wait for his return.

Tickets:
Click here for tickets for Willy Mason at the Cluny

Poster:
Visit the blog of Kerry Hyndman, who designed the poster for this show.

Photos:
Click Here for Hi-Res Photos for Willy Mason at The Cluny (Note: Uploaded to TinyPic, ignore the ads.

Video:
Click here for a short of Willy performing at the Tunstall Hill Sessions, at 2010's Split Festival.

testing email subscriptions

2010-11-11T02:16:00.001-08:00

testing testing one two one two

Casiotone For The Painfully Alone + Withered Hand @ The Other Rooms Fri 12th November

2010-11-08T08:56:00.000-08:00

PLEASE NOTE: THIS EVENT HAS BEEN MOVED TO THE OTHER ROOMS, TIME SQUARE.

SEE DIRECTIONS TO THE OTHER ROOMS

We're so glad to have Casiotonetone for the Painfully Alone playing in Newcastle as part of his Farewell Tour.

Owen Ashworth has been making music since 1997, and has performed and toured as Cftpa for 13 years.

In that time he pioneered a an ultra lo fi aesthetic, using just some inexpensive battery operated keyboards and electronics and a 4 track cassette recorder to create an utterly idiosyncratic accompaniment to his occasionally funny and almost always heart rending confessional lyrics.

Its with this set up that he performs on this, his last ever tour.

WITHERED HAND:

Casiotone For The Painfully Alone will be supported by Edinburgh's Withered Hand on this date.
Withered Hand is on Absolutely Kosher Records (Mountain Goats, The Wrens) and is one of my favourite songwriters.
Here's Mojo's 4 star review
"his impressive debut Dan Willson’s alter ego attains the celestial lustre of that holy grail of lapsed evangelical folk nouveau, the first Palace Brothers album."

Damn right. Damn, Right?

For Fans Of:
If you've been lit up inside by the likes of Mountain Goats, Jeffrey Lewis, The Smiths, Magnetic Fields or Why? in the past, but haven't heard ctfpa; please don't pass over on this one.

Pictures:

CLICK HERE FOR HI RES PHOTOS OF CASIOTONE FOR THE PAINFULLY ALONE IN NEWCASTLE

CLICK HERE FOR PHOTOS OF WITHERED HAND

PRESS/ QUOTES:

CLICK HERE FOR PRESS FOR CASIOTONE FOR THE PAINFULLY ALONE

TICKETS:

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS FOR CASIOTONE FOR THE PAINFULLY ALONE

Wolves In The Throne Room @ Cluny 2, November 29th

2010-10-20T06:57:00.000-07:00

portions for foxes presents:

WOLVES IN THE THRONE ROOM (US, Southern Lord)
www.wittr.com
+ Khunnt
+ Wodensthrone

@ CLUNY 2, NOVEMBER 29th.

from Southern Lord Bio;
"During the Summer of 2002 at an Earth First rendezvous in the Cascade Mountains of Washington State, guitarist Nathan Weaver was inspired to create a band that merged a Cascadian eco-spiritual awareness with the misanthropic Norwegian eruptions of the 90's. The band envisioned would strive to create a mythic space where artist and listener alike could strip away the mindset of the mundane to reveal a more ancient and transcendent consciousness. The mysterious and wild energies of the untrammeled forests of the Northwest would be channeled into sonic form."

"The fall of 2006 brought a pact with Southern Lord records and the beginning of a relationship with producer-engineer Randall Dunn. (SUNN O))), Earth, Grails) Their epic album Two Hunters is a masterfully dark and emotional document that further established Wolves in the Throne Room as a band totally unafraid to follow their own path."

Reviews:
"dark, haunting music that's as gorgeous as it is ugly. "
pitchfork 7.7.

MP3s
listen to Wanderer Above A Sea Of Fog:
http://www.southernlord.com/mp3/Wolves%20Edit.mp3

IMAGES and PRESS:
Click here for images and press for Wolves In The Throne Room Newcastle
Tickets here and at RPM Records and Beatdown:

TICKETS £10 Advance Click below or visit Beatdown or RPM Records
Click here for Wolves In The Throne Room Newcastle tickets

Last Lungs @ Head Of Steam, November 19th

2010-10-20T06:54:00.000-07:00

portions presents:

LAST LUNGS (Deep Elm)
http://www.myspace.com/lastlungs

@ Head Of Steam, Friday November 19th

for fans of; Explosions In The Sky, Mogwai, Appleseed Cast

"A meticulous merger of glistening beauty and glaring power, LAST LUNGS glows on their debut with a sprawling display of melody, mood and superior sonic craftsmanship. Like am old grizzly bear walking ever so gently through the forest knowing it can exert tremendous force at will, the album alternates unpredictably between explosive intensity and sparkling serenity...whispering and screaming, all without words. The flawless flow of soaring guitars and storming soundscapes aside, it's really Last Lungs' keen ability to know just when to punch in and pull back that undoubtedly casts an anchor for this band on the modern instrumental stage. Look At That Old Grizzly Bear is elegantly epic, sweepingly cinematic music that always pays off."

support:
http://www.myspace.com/arcsandtrauma
+
www.myspace.com/waskerleyway

Tickets £4 on the door or at RPM Records.

Door 7pm

Titus Andronicus @ Cluny 2 November 23rd

2010-10-20T06:16:00.000-07:00

portions for foxes presents:

TITUS ANDRONICUS (US, Xl Records)

...Titus Andronicus is a punk/indie rock band from Glenn Rock New Jersey.

Their two records 2008's 'Airing Of Grievances' and 2010's 'The Monitor', with their sprawling song lengths and euphoric sing along moments, give an impression of what Bruce Springsteen would sound like if he were raised on Neutral Milk Hotel or My Bloody Valentine records rather than Buddy Holly and Roy Orbison.

'The Monitor', Titus' loosely conceptual album based on the American Civil War (with a lyric sheet that reads like Albert Camus if he were Not In Education, Employment or Training) is the funnest, most singularly giant sized 'FUCK YOU' to the modern world ever commited to plastic.
Pianos crash, lead guitars howl squealing rock and roll jigs over velvety beds of shoegaze fuzz, harmonicas, trumpets, strings and bagpipes swell and lift, grab you by the gut, by the ear; yelling sweat-drenched, feverish glee between the earlobes. It's almost impossible not to sing along,

Large size photo of band:
CLICK HERE FOR PHOTOS OF TITUS ANDRONICUS IN NEWCASTLE

Band Website:

http://www.myspace.com/titusandronicus

Reviews:
punknews - 4.5/5
pitchfork 8.5
drowned in sound 9/10
guardian 4/5
rock sound 7/10

fans of: Springsteen, Desaparecidos, Arcade Fire, My Bloody Valentine

Tickets are £7.50 advance.

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS FOR TITUS ANDRONICUS IN NEWCASTLE

Edwyn Collins @ The Cluny November 9th

2010-07-30T03:48:00.001-07:00

The legendary scottish songwriter, Postcard Records co-founder and ex frontman of the seminal 80's post punk act Orange Juice.

We are so proud to be bring a living legend with such an incredibly influential 30 year history of pop music to Newcastle.

Edwyn is touring in support of his seventh studio album 'Losing Sleep', which comes in leui of his miraculous recovery from a serious brain hemorrhage and illness in 2005, which left him paralysed down one side and with a condition called aphasia, hindering his ability to speak.

The album features an diverse array of contributing artists and co-writers from some of pop and rock's most well known acts, past and present: Ryan Jarman (The Cribs), Johnny Marr (uh, The Smiths), Roddy Frame, Alex Kapranos, Nick McCarthy (both Franz Ferdinand) Romeo Stodart (Magic Numbers) and The Drums.

______________

Collins was a leading figure on the alternative Scottish scene in the late 1970s and 1980s, forming his first band, Nu-Sonics, aged 17. The band was later renamed Orange Juice, their first single released on Postcard Records (who later became home to Aztec Camera and Josef K). They then inked a deal with Polydor and released four studio albums whose jaunty, lustrous take on post punk; bouncing on David Mclymont's rubbery basslines and floating on Collin's chiming diminished chords and his breathy, sinus inflected voice, took a knife-blade eccentricity and carved out a hole in the belly of Post Punk .

The band briefly broke into the mainstream with Rip It Up in 1983, a hit so big that Simon Reynolds chose the name for his definitive book on post punk music.
The band disbanded a year later.
Edwyn then pursued a solo career with mixed results until A Girl Like You, a top 10 hit in seven countries in 1995 that anyone over 18 is guaranteed to have heard on the radio at some point in their lives.
Collins has recently turned to producing, working with acts including Sons and Daughters, The Cribs and Little Barrie.

Edwyn tours now after making an incredible return to the stage following a cerebral hemorrhage in 2005.

TICKETS:

TICKETS ARE £15 Advance available at RPM Records. or online:
CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS FOR EDWYN COLLINS AT NEWCASTLE CLUNY

IMAGES:

CLICK HERE FOR HI RES IMAGES FOR EDWYN COLLINS @ NEWCASTLE CLUNY

pff presents: Melt Banana @ Star And Shadow Cinema, October 18th

2010-07-27T07:21:00.000-07:00

Melt Banana are a 'noise-punk' band from Tokyo, Japan.

How to describe Melt Banana is so difficult that it's easier to look at the facts and the panaroma of their career of over 15 years, 10 albums and 23 EPS and try to see which adjectives stick best.

Most obvious is a furious inventiveness that has burnt like a gasoline bonfire for nearly two decades without any sign of burning out. In the ash left behind: years of music that somehow melds ultra fast, twitching punk and hardcore with huge riffs and moments of constant feedback to squawking half cartoon half hip hop vocals. If Melt Banana was a spray tin can of sugar infused cream cheese (which it could be) it'd come with added e-numbers and a 5% digital hardcore 10% noise-trash extra Free.

BUT! To focus on their recorded output wouldn't be the best marker for how much of a treat this live show will be: Melt Banana's live shows and sets have been issued around the world as a recording of how incredibly they can intersperse their hits with seconds long ultrasonic musical hand grenades and freeform improvisation. Something worth trawling youtube for, if you aren't worried about spoiling the surprise.

Tickets are £10 Advance, available at RPM Records.

or Click Here for Tickets for Melt Banana in Newcastle.

Click Here for the Star And Shadow Website.

Photographs:

Click for Photographs for Melt Banana in Newcastle

Support:
support acts TBC

About Portions For Foxes

2010-07-01T06:21:00.001-07:00

Hi,

Loads of great bands have played for us* in the North East since Portions started in earnest in 2006, coming to Newcastle or Sunderland from all over the world:

Dum Dum Girls, Diane Cluck, Kissaway Trail, Fang Island, The Slits, Harlem, Nina Nastasia,Vivian Girls,Daniel Johnston, Laura Marling, Wave Pictures, Isis, Wavves,Neva Dinova, Russian Circles, Emmy The Great,Parts And Labor, Daughters!, Jeffrey Lewis, O'Death, Okkervil River,Caribou, Lucero, Jason Molina, Pelican,High On Fire, The 101, Awesome Color, Settlefish, Final Fantasy, Beezewax, Make Believe, The Usaisamonster, Jeniferever,Ned,Great Lake Swimmers,Maria Taylor, Someone Still Loves You, Boris Yeltsin,Hot Cross.

I hope you find all this as fun as I do.

Thanks,

David

* Officially, I book the bands, but a lot of people have and do help and its unfair to use a single person pronoun for these reasons. **

** Not like you care anyhow.

Independents Day, 4th JUly @ RPM

2010-07-01T06:06:00.000-07:00

This from Newcastle's RPM record store, who are celebrating 'Independent's Day' with food, music, DJs and record deals this weekend:

"To coincide with Independence day in America RPM thought that it would celebrate Independents Day, celebrating everything that is great about Independent stores in general and particularly Independent Record Store. Things kick off around midday and we've got around 5 bands playing to be confirmed very shortly in the courtyard by the pub, great music played throughout the day as well as a load of great new stock racked out all through the shop so you can grab yourself a bargain. There'll be free tea and coffee throughout the day, and if you're lucky even a biscuit or two as well as some ice cream and ice lollys.. assuming we can find a freezer of some kind in time. Also, DJs throughout the day tba

The other things we've got planned are a free raffle which you can enter just by turning up with great prizes as well as loads of reduced items for your purchasing pleasure!

Bands Confirmed to play
1pm - Rainfalldown
http://www.myspace.com/rainfalldown
2pm - Our Imaginary Friends
http://www.myspace.com/ourimaginaryfriends
3pm - Maybe Myrtle Tyrtle
http://www.myspace.com/maybemyrtletyrtle
4pm - Cult Image
http://www.myspace.com/ignoranceinthunorf
5pm - 'Im & 'Im
http://www.myspace.com/imandim"

Fang Island @ Cluny 2 Monday Sept. 6th

2010-07-01T05:37:00.001-07:00

Portions for foxes presents:
Fang Island
+ Support

Fang Island is an incredibly explosive, heavily caffeinated, monster. One likely to seize, besiege, and overpower your senses in a pink/purple spray of Diesel ( does anyone still drink that?) vomit strewn with chunks of riffs, soloing and vocal harmony...yawned straight from the party mouth of Andrew WK.

This is what happiness sounds like!
http://www.myspace.com/fangisland
http://fangisland.com/bio/

Tickets:
Tickets £7.50 advance
Click forTickets for Fang Island in Newcastle

Photos:
Click Here for Hi Res Photographs of Fang Island

Listen:
Click Here for 'Daisy' (its a video.)

Quotes:
"llike some crazy jam session between Fairport Convention and Faith No More, or between the Incredible String Band and Deep Purple as conducted by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, only played by people dressed as human-sized furry cartoon animals because it seemed like a fun idea"
The Guardian

"Fang Island are simply Killer Fun"
Mojo 4/5

"A Joyous, jangling, low fidelity mess of riffs and shout a long choruses"
Vice 8/10

"This music is just honest and life-affirming and infectious, and it's that rare concentration of directness and simplicity that makes Fang Island so uniquely and wonderfully inclusive"
Pitchfork 8.3/10.

The band have a perpetual smile on their face, a sun shiny, achingly positive mix of Trans Am, The Fucking Champs, Don Caballero and Boston'
Rock Sound

FACEBOOK EVENT:
Click here for Fang Island Newcastle Facebook Event

Diane Cluck at Morden Tower, Newcastle September 21st

2010-06-22T05:42:00.000-07:00

Diane Cluck plays a low key gig for us this September in the turret room of Morden Tower, a Newcastle poetry reading room with an incredibly rich history (read more about Morden Tower here)

Frequently associated with the New York anti-folk scene, Diane's music makes an awkward fit among the likes of Moldy Peaches or sometime collaborator Jeffrey Lewis. On her records to date, including the best known 'Oh Vanille, Ova Nil' she writes like a creepier, more agitated Joni Mitchell or Karen Dalton. The minimalistic acoustic arrangements leave the focus almost entirely on her incredible voice, its wonderful range given to coiling into a dissonant wail on 'Easy To Be Around' or 'My Teacher Died'.

In 2007, when Diane last played Newcastle, hearing such an arresting instrument live was an awkard joy t0 behold, equally unnerving and beautifully arresting. As though a vinly recording of an exotic songbird were being played backwards.

For this gig Diane will play with Anders Griffin, (Regina Spektor, Frank Lowe, Jeffrey Lewis) a multi-directional drum set player who performs with a range of choreographers, jazz musicians and song writers. He is characterized by his unique, supportive accompaniment and ability to play in acoustic situations with sensitivity and nuance. He holds a degree in music composition and is the head catalog librarian at the Manhattan School of Music.

A very limited amount of tickets are available. Gig is Bring Your Own Beer.

Click Here For Tickets for Diane Cluck in Newcastle

or get tickets for Diane Cluck in Newcastle at RPM Records.

PHOTOS:

Click here for Photos of Diane Cluck

MP3s:
Click here for 'Easy To Be Around'

CONTACT:

get me on portions for foxes at gmail dot com for details.

reccomended gigs june-july

2010-06-08T03:30:00.000-07:00

A little bit quiet this summer but in addition to the bands Permanent Vibes tempts me with, I hope to visit The SummerTyne festival this year, if only to get on the Americana Boat i've heard so much about. Also see Narc Fest, where we have Kissaway Trail playing with a load of other bands for free around Ouseburn Valley.

all gigs listed at the Sage Gateshead visit their website: LINK

details of the Summer Tyne festival here: LINK

JUNE:

Extra Life @ Star and Shadow 8th June:
Facebook

The Wave Pictures @ Head Of Steam, 9th June:
Facebook

Brilliant Colours @ Star and Shadow, 11th June
Facebook

Harlem @ Head Of Steam, 14th June
Facebook

Rival Consoles @ The Tyne, 19th June
Facebook

High Wolf @ The Culture Lab, 23rd June
Facebook

Elvis Costello @ The Sage, 30th June

JULY:

Narc Fest: Kissaway Trail, The Heartbreaks, Withered Hand and more:
17th July in the Ouseburn Valley
Facebook

Regina Spektor: 20th July @ The Sage Gateshead

Murder, Misery and Then Goodnight: An evening of murder ballads and old time Americana:
Kristin Hersh, The Handsome Family, Tim Eriksen, Eliza Carthy, Howe Gelb and special guests.
@ The Sage, 23rd July

Dum Dum Girls 26th July @ The Cluny
Facebook

Zappa Plays Zappa 27th july @ The Sage Gateshead

DUM DUM GIRLS @ The Cluny, July 26th

2010-05-25T04:12:00.003-07:00

prmnt vibes are helping us with this, visit their blog here:

Dum Dum Girls play girl-group rock and roll which, with the help of Richard Gotterher's production work, buries insanely catchy melodies beneath a shimmering cloak of ethereal echoes and twinkling lead guitars.

They call the sound the 'Blissed Out Buzzsaw', which sounds like it could be heavy metal, but rather than jarr your ears, Dum Dum Girls record 'I Will Be' is eleven of the most sugary sweet pop songs in existence right now.

TICKETS:
TICKETS ARE £8 advance at RPM
or CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS TO DUM DUM GIRLS IN NEWCASTLE

PRESS:
CLICK HERE TO READ PRESS FOR I WILL BE

PHOTOS:
CLICK HERE FOR HI RES PHOTOS OF DUM DUM GIRLS:

MP3s:
Click here to hear 'Jail La La' from 'I Will Be'

The Kissaway Trail to Headline Narc Fest

2010-05-21T05:17:00.000-07:00

Portions For Foxes and Narc presents

THE KISSAWAY TRAIL

@ The Cluny, Byker, July 17th.

from their Bella Union Site:
"The Kissaway Trail are Thomas L. Fagerlund (vox, guitar), Søren B. Corneliussen (vox, guitar), Daniel Skjoldmose (guitar, keys, backing vocals), Rune Pedersen (bass, backing vocals) and Hasse Mydtskov (drums, backing vocals).

Euphoric and evocative, listening to The Kissaway Trail is an intoxicating experience. The debut album released in 2007 was filled with songs of immense ambition and scope, the music soars, filled with majestic guitar lines, dramatic melodies and epic arrangements. The Kissaway Trail have that rare power to lift people out of their lives and transport them to a world of drama, beauty and wonder.

The Kissaway Trail list the likes of Sonic Youth, Grandaddy, Daniel Johnston, Pixies and The Beach Boys as being their main influences, though in their native Denmark, where they have recently taken off massively due to their incendiary live shows, the band have quickly developed a unique sound of their own. Forthcoming album ‘Sleep Mountain’ out March 1st 2010 is a remarkable return. Recorded in Denmark, the band then heard from Peter Katis, legendary producer of Interpol, The National, Twilight Sad, Tokyo Police Club who expressed a desire to work with the band. And just a month or so later, he was indeed mixing the album in his own Tarquin Studios in Connecticut. The result, well you’ll hear it soon enough, is spectacular."

The band Headline Narc Festival: check out www.narcmedia.com for more updates.

PRESS:

MP3s:
email:
jason.rackham"at"cooperativemusic.com

PHOTOGRAPHS:
email:
jason.rackham"at"cooperativemusic.com

The Wave Pictures @ Head Of Steam Wednesday June 9th

2010-05-11T04:06:00.000-07:00

After wonderful shows in support of Daniel Johnston and at the Star And Shadow last year, we're pleased to bring back The Wave Pictures around the release of their new 'Sweetheart' EP.

Wave Pictures are a long running, ultra DIY troupe of doomed romantics, currently on Moshi Moshi Records (of slow club / the drums fame). One with a huge catalogue of records behind them; including collaborations with darren hayman, mountain goats and herman dune. Their literate, kitchen sink drama pop borrows from jonathan richman, herman dune and imbibes them with a smithslike profundity and an obvious and sharply observational englishness-ness.

QUOTES:
Pitchfork: 7.8
"Like sometime collaborators and fellow logophiles the Mountain Goats, the Wave Pictures write songs for fans of songwriting"

Guardian
"charming, witty pop songs shot through with Jonathan Richman's gawky glee and Suede's doomed provincial romanticism... They owe a certain debt to The Smiths, and Tattersall has Morrissey's knack of marrying the ridiculous and the sublime"

PHOTOS:
CLICK HERE FOR HI RES SHOTS OF THE WAVE PICTURES,
or email:
amanda'at'freemanpr.net

MP3S;
CLICK HERE FOR MP3s
amanda'at'freemanpr.net

HARLEM (US, Matador) @ Head Of Steam, June 14th

2010-04-26T01:29:00.000-07:00

I can't think of any better way to spend a summer's evening than in front of Harlem live.

These fantastic new Matador signings play a kind of grungey garage rock with the warmth of a 10pm beachside sunset and the sweetness of a pair of ice cream cones.

And so infectious! tunes like "Gay Human Bones" and "South Of France", with sparse materials: a guitar, a drum kit, some singing, a bass, will incurably bury themselves in your mind like some jungle dwelling monkey Tick. So deep that no doctor in the western world could ever remove. I'm speaking as the chronically infected here.

Tickets are £6 advance.
at RPM
or HERE

for fans of:
the pixies, black lips, sic alps, wavves, jay reatard, surf rock, stooges with a load of echoes

Photographs:
Click Here for Hi Res Photographs of Harlem

MP3s:
Click here for Mp3s from their latest album 'Hippies'

Get yourself on the North East Music Forum

2010-04-14T00:44:00.001-07:00

Are you looking to meet hot guys and girls just waiting to listen to your opinions on the latest leaked B-side from the new The National album?

Come and join the North East Music Forum!

Nina Nastasia @ Cluny 2 May 26th

2010-04-12T04:15:00.000-07:00

Honey throated songstress and (John) Peel darling Nina Nastasia comes to Newcastle for an intimate concert in Cluny 2.

She'll be touring Outlaster, her first record since 2007's You Follow Me, the collobaration with Jim White of Dirty Three.

Hollywood-born but now resident in New York City, Nina has carved out a career as a singer-songwriter there since the early '90s, making grand-sounding chamber folk bouyed with sumptous string orchestrations that lie somewhere between Bill Callahan, Will Oldham and Vashti Bunyan.
To date her six albums - 'Dogs' (2000), 'The Blackened Air' (2001), ‘The Blackened Air’ (2002), ‘Run To Ruin’ (2003), ‘On Leaving’ (2006) and ‘You Follow Me’ (2007) – have garnered widespread critical acclaim and a devoted fanbase. Dogs was a favourite of the late John Peel, and legendary producer Steve Albini had this to say about the record:

"In the process of making a record, you hear it so many times that the charms of even the best of them can wear off through over-exposure. On rare occasions, records I've worked on have withstood this scrutiny and ended up being personal favorites. Nina Nastasia's 'Dogs' is a record so simultaneously unassuming and grandiose that I can't really describe it, except in terms that would make it (and me) sound silly. Of the couple thousand records I've been involved with, this is one of my favourites, and one that I'm proud to be associated with."

TICKETS:
CLICK FOR TICKETS TO SEE NINA NASTASIA IN NEWCASTLE

Photographs:
CLICK HERE FOR HI RES PHOTOGRAPHS OF NINA NASTASIA

MP3:
or check out the new single here:
http://fat-cat.co.uk/fatcat/release.php?id=315

Facebook:
Click here for the Nina Nastasia Facebook Event

Recommended Newcastle gigs April and May

2010-04-12T03:40:00.000-07:00

Here's a list of gigs in Newcastle that you should see in April and May. Even if it's a recession that's affecting you so bad that you're eating you're own shoes. Back in my day shoes was all we ever had to eat and we didn't complain, we just went to gigs anyhow. Click for Facebook invites and more details.

APRIL:

15th: G.Involved Presents: Gold Panda

23rd: Pmnt Vibes presents: A Grave With No Name
f=ts

30th: Pmnt Vibes presents: Talk Normal

May:

1st: G.I. Presents Crystal Antlers

2nd: ex libris presents Darren Hayman

8th: P4foxes Presents THE SLITS

10th: G. I. Presents: Think About Life

11th: Cluny Presents Ted Leo and the Pharmacists

16th: The Sage Ghead Presents Randy Newman

19th: Pmnt Vibes presents: Ganglians

26th P4foxes presents NINA NASTASIA

30th/31st May: Jumpin Hot Club Presents:
Dawn Landes, The Unthanks, King Creosote, Donovan, Slow Club, Lissie @ Evolution Festival

Hear Minotaurs "Eat Yr Hate" Online

2010-03-23T03:02:00.000-07:00

Up until now, I haven't used this blog for scene reports, figuring Toonwaves.co.uk does that pretty well anyhow, but I'm going to look to pitch in now and again with some reccomendations.

Anyone that was at the Okkervil River gig in November of 2007 will have seen South Shields' Minotaurs providing the opening support slot.
To the best of my know how, (and I've been a scene exile for a year), the band haven't played all the much in the interem period. Here's why: they've been working on putting together Eat Yr Hate, their long anticipated debut record.

The band are shipping 500 copies of the LP, and you can order it at: http://minotaurs.bandcamp.com/

Here's some words:
"Originally birthing in 2006, South Shields sextet Minotaurs have been all too quiet for the past year or so. Luckily the bulk of that time has been spent writing, honing and recording their long-awaited debut album 'Eat yr Hate' in deepest Northumberland with Woodpigeon producer, Arran Fisher. Giving weight to their choice of name, as performances by the band became less frequent their mythology seemed to grow. A live performance being treat with a similar reverence as the sniffing out of a truffle. In 2007 The Guardian writer, Laura Barton, dedicated an entire column to the band after stumbling upon them on a whim and its only recently they've thankfully started gigging again. Supporting Twilight Sad in October.

Despite being preoccupied by the darker side of human nature, Minotaurs are far from cynical gloom peddlers. Their music is loaded with two things rare in contemporary British guitar music; sincerity and substance. They find the lust behind sentiment, the worm in the apple, shards of glass in the glitter and make lifes ugly truths both beautiful and haunting. Old Hollywood images of red-dress clad women being carried into the sun are contrasted with the uncomfortable reality of relationships red in tooth and claw. Intricate arrangements and striking melodies take the edge away from lyrics dealing with loss, co-dependence, the stifling and occasionally recuperative nature of home.

Each song on 'Eat Yr Hate' is like a contemporary ghost story loaded with snapshots of regret, stagnation and missed opportunity but amongst there lies one important quality, hope. That hope is achieved through escapism and tenderness. While Sarah's pitch-perfect vocals soar, Andrew's crack and falter striking a heartbreaking dichotomy. While Belle and Sebastian, Fairport Convention and even Prefrab Sprout have been used as reference points Minotaurs are that rare thing; a band that sound more like themselves than anyone else. In an age dominated by cynicism, careerism, imitation and artifice they're something to cling to."

Andrew Richardson, January 2010

THE SLITS: Trapped Animal Biog

2010-03-10T05:10:00.001-08:00

Please credit the below to Vivien Goldman.

This truly her-storical album marks the return to the studio of the Slits, London's original wild girls of punk. Yes, call it a major comeback, because on "Trapped Animal" the core Slits possee of dynamo singer Arri-Up and bassie Tessa Pollitt, now grown women, join forces with a new generation of junior Slits, Hollie Cook, singer/keyboard player, drummer Anna Schultz, guitarist Adele Wilson and part-time Slit, Ana Ozawa to form what Arri describes on 'Reggae Gypsy' as "a tribal warrior princess, gathering a tribe of tribal woman warriors, breaking down the barriers..."

Three decades after their raucous birth, the Slits are the undisputed godmothers of every feisty female from Madonna to the riot grrrrls, Pink and Lily Allen. Witty and provocative, the glory of Trapped Animal proves what the faithful always believed -- the Slits are the real deal and the "Trapped Animal" is all of us.

Steered by dubmaster Adrian Sherwood, the Slits' sound voyages into a free zone of extravagant texture and timing. In this sonically splendiferous, cinematic soundscape, the Slits' dub-based beat both defines punk and transcends it. Mind-bending dub sections illuminate tracks like 'Babylon,' a deep roots steppers track, the album's only cover, which puts our cynical system in its place. Most of the tracks are composed by the legendary dreadlock'd Arri-Up, who famously co-founded the band in 1976 when she was fourteen years old.

"All my life I have felt trapped, fighting for my freedom," says Arri. After the Slits went their separate ways in the early 1980s, she went to live among the tribes in the jungle in Borneo -- just as their ancestral hunting grounds were being seized. "They were amazing free spirit people," she recalls. Her next incarnation was as a dancehall queen in the Kingston, Jamaica ghetto, re-named Madusa. Arri's urge for liberation courses throughout 'Trapped Animal,' blasting an uncut view of human relationships so frank it's startling. Lyrically, 'Trapped Animal' is a savagely realistic, fiercely funny testament to everything these women have learned since their stormy saga began. Compulsive and insanely catchy, the group's wicked grooves march head on into serious topics like 'Issues,' about how people deal with abuse, and healing anti-love songs like 'Ask Ma' and 'Partner From Hell.' Though Arri might seem to sing to a man, as she says, the ideas can apply to either gender: "If abuse is going on, let's not say it's just down to either man or woman." For happier gender delight, Arri also supplies the tongue-in-cheeky eroticism of 'Lazy Slam,' one of the best ever evocations of how females really feel about sex.

One of the most exciting aspects of the record is the stubborn continuity, the way these women were compelled to continue their artistic explorations -- and how their tribe of "musical prophets" has grown. Bassie Tessa Pollitt traveled the deserts of Sudan and became a judo instructor in her time out from the Slits. She says of their re-formation, "I couldn't think of the Slits without Arri. And Hollie (whose parents are Paul Cook, Sex Pistols' drummer and Jennie, singer of Two Tone band, the Belle Stars,) is like the baby of the Slits and the Pistols. Reggae is in her blood." Pollitt's own eerie, film noir songs 'Can't Relate' and 'Had A Day' with their jazzy echoes of Kurt Weill's Berlin cabaret operettas, add a dark neo-emo gothic feel perfect for our disjointed times.

The positive energy generated by the Slits changed everything for the band's youngest new member, Hollie Cook. After experiencing disillusion in her previous flirtations with the music business, Hollie says, "I had no confidence to write songs. Really, the Slits liberated me." The sweet lover's rock of 'Cry Baby' is Hollie's first song and it makes you want more. And Anna Ozama, a part-time Slit, contributes a plaintive track in Japanese, 'Be It,' ensuring that the Slits live up to their "outernational" promise.

When the band began, radio DJ's refused to say their name on the air. When the Slits performed on the White Riot tour in 1977 with their cohorts, the Sex Pistols and the Clash, the bus driver had to be bribed to carry these crazy chicks. "Outcasts of the outcasts, with horizons so vast" is how Arri describes their relationship to society, let alone the pop world, on 'Reggae Gypsy' a dancehall flamenco statement of identity and intent that is in many ways the soul of this record. The bouncy ska of 'Peer Pressure' details Arri's alienation even when she was at school.

The Slits released three albums, the seminal CUT (produced by Dennis Bovell, it's one of just fifty albums from their vast catalog to be re-issued by Island/Universal as part of the Island 50th Anniversary tribute,) as well as the 'Return of the Giant Slits', with its jazzier post-punk feel, the much-loved live sessions from Britain's progressive John Peel radio show. Some tracks were also released on the indie label, Rough Trade. For all their originality and large cultural influence and contribution, the Slits have always remained proud outsiders, underground rebels with an attitude that now looks to be eternal. But there had never been anything like the Slits before, and their energy was an eruption of fresh invention, fuelled by the sort of struggle they sing about with such assurance in 'Pay Rent.' The Slits' youthful flourish attains full fruition on Trapped Animal's astounding cycle of songs. On the powerful surge of 'Can't Relate,' Arri's keening vocal says it right: "It's a Slits virus... infectious, infectious, infectious..."

THE SLITS @ Star And Shadow Cinema, Saturday May 8th.

2010-03-10T04:55:00.000-08:00

The Slits bring their unique brand of punk/ethno/reggae boundary teasing, pigeonhole evading, rawk to the star and shadow, saturday 8th May.

Hear snippets of Cut, the band's massively influential, seminal, landmark etc. album wherein they wed grrl pnk attitude, razor blade wit, slash-punk chords and wonderfully counter intuitive, off-kilter vocal harmony to dub, dance reggae and drum beats pilfered from south of the equator. Also hear Trapped Animal, the band's first record in 25 years, which revamped and reinstated their approach to rock music on its release october 2009.

hear them on myspace:
www.myspace.com/theslits

PHOTOGRAPHS
CLICK HERE FOR HI-RES PHOTOS OF THE SLITS

TICKETS
Tickets are £13.50 advance,available at RPM
or CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS TO SEE THE SLITS IN NEWCASTLE:

SUPPORTS:

Retriever
www.myspace.com/retrieverretriever

and One Night Stand In North Dakota

www.myspace.com/onenightstandinnorthdakota

plus permanent vibes djs.

Facebook:

CLick here to see Facebook Invite.

Vivian Girls @ Newcastle Cluny, January 21st

2009-11-26T05:35:00.000-08:00

Portions is bringing NYC's Vivian Girls to Newcastle on January 21st.

Here's some critical acclaim for the band:

“The Vivian Girls drop sweet girl-group melodies into proto-shoegaze squalls the way the Jesus & Mary Chain used to and the way groups like the Aislers Set, C86s-ers the Shop Assistants, and the Manhattan Love Suicides have done with female vocalists. They keep the Shangri-Las’ melodrama to boot.” —Pitchfork

“They deflect the knee-jerk criticism the most effective way possible... with an armful of kick-ass songs.” —Pitchfork

“Vivian Girls is a guileless wash of bubblegum melodies, teen angel harmonies, slap-happy drumming, and thick reverb.” —SPIN

“Best Start queuing now….” Time Out

“Self effacingly cool rock” The Guardian

“With echoes of Vaselines and the Shop Assistants in their sound, too, Vivian Girls may just have released the best album of its type in 2008 – this eponymous debut drips with a confidence beyond the band’s years, and fits no particular fashion of today.” Clash Online

“It’s unlikely you’ll find a more tasteful slice of fun on any record this year!” NME

TICKETS:
tickets available at RPM, Beatdown and Alt. Vinyl

CLICK HERE FOR VIVIAN GIRLS TICKETS

www.myspace.com/viviangirlsnyc

PHOTOS:

Click here for Hi Res Photos of Vivian Girls

Support:

Lets Buy Happiness
http://www.myspace.com/letsbuyhappinessuk

+ more tbc

Posters recap

2009-11-26T05:19:00.001-08:00

www.thismeanswaugh.blogspot.com

Posters

2009-11-26T05:13:00.001-08:00

Hey Portions,

Who does those sweet looking Posters i've seen for your gigs with Daniel Johnston, Wavves, Vivian Girls and Wave Pictures?

Andrew Waugh does them!

Check out the feed for his posters here:

http://thismeanswaugh.blogspot.com/search/label/gig%20poster

cheers,

Portions

buy tickets for Isis in Newcastle

2009-09-16T08:43:00.001-07:00

http://www.wegottickets.com/event/59707

Portions For Foxes Presents WAVVES @ Head Of Steam, November

2009-09-16T06:35:00.000-07:00

Portions For Foxes Presents:

WAVVES
www.myspace.com/wavves

Ballsy move this.

why ballsy?

That depends on which hipster you ask.
Some consider Wavves, the project of 22 year old skateboarder Nathan Williams, to have recieved a stellar amount of hype in the past year that correlates disproportionately to his talents.

Others recognise his talents like a celebrity Chef recognizes the potential taste of a good recipe:
first create psychedelic pop punk tunes that bring to mind a blend of early Nirvana and Descendents. Give them a skin-graft of Doo Wop: a sprinkling of 50s girl group sounds...The Ronettes for instance.
Then pulverise the two togetherin that No-Wave, Noise-Bath meatgrinder popularised by No Age*
yum.

these are tunes that, upon first hearing, one of the two promoters of this gig was heard to say 'my goodness me, this is catchier than Blink 182'.

there's a Wavve of hype young Mr. Williams is surfing fer sure, but deservedly so. When the tide goes out 20 years from now, tunes like No Hope Kids (see below) and 'So Bored' will remain bouyant because Pop tunes this agreeable will float no matter the era.

same way that Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure still makes for great viewing to this very day.

Where?

Head Of Steam
Newcastle
November 23rd

Photographs:
Click Here for Photographs of Wavves

Tickets:
In shops and at
http://www.wegottickets.com/event/58868

ISIS @ The Cluny, October 26th

2009-09-16T05:47:00.001-07:00

Portions For Foxes and Pineapple Folk presents:

ISIS

Los Angeles' undisputed kings of ambient, epic metal visit Newcastle, October 26th.

Isis tour this October in support of their new album Wavering Radiant, and we are pleased to be bringing their apocalyptic metal soundscapes to Newcastle as part of the tour.

Over the space of five albums, four Eps and twelve years, Isis have proved year on year favourites of the discerning rock press. Their musical template: beautiful, soaring melody secreted among slow burning, steamroller riffs and guttural howls have inspired a generation of similar artists worldwide, some to borrow and innovate, growing out of the sound like Isis grew from their early influences, Godflesh, Tool and Melvins, others formulaic clones.

With Wavering Radiant, Isis once more up the ante, weaving further subtleties and nuances between familiar monolithic riffing and sinister ambience. A 54 minute sonic measurement of the distance between Isis and their pretenders.

We're really pleased to have a band with such a world famous live show playing for us.

When:

Isis play The Cluny, Newcastle (Byker)
Monday October 26th

Tickets:

Tickets available Cluny, Hot Rats, Alt Vinyl, Beatdown Records

and here:
http://www.speakeasypr.com/clientbio.php?client=89

Photographs:
Click Here For Hi Res Photographs

Critics say:

4* guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/may/01/isis-wavering-radiant-review

9.1 pfork:
http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/4135-oceanic/

8.5 pfork:
http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/4136-panopticon/

8/10 rock sound:
http://www.rocksound.tv/reviews/article/isis-wavering-radiant

8/10 drowned in sound:
http://drownedinsound.com/releases/14404/reviews/4136824-isis-wavering-radiant

pff Presents: Daniel Johnston @ Sage Gateshead, Thursday 5th November

2009-08-27T08:35:00.000-07:00

DANIEL JOHNSTON

@: The Sage Gateshead, Thursday 5th November @ 7.30pm. Tickets 18.50, see link below
‎

Daniel Johnston has spent the last 20 or so years exposing his heartrending tales of unrequited love, cosmic mishaps, and existential torment to an ever-growing international cult audience.

He began his prolific musical career in the early 1980s, recording albums including 'Songs of Pain' and 'Yip Jump Music' in his parent's basement and self-releasing them on tape.

His status as a cult icon has seen continual resurgence through the acclaim of the late Kurt Cobain, collaboration with Butthole Surfers, Sonic Youth and covers of his music by artists such as Tom Waits, Eels, Bright Eyes and Flaming Lips.

In recent years he was the feature of an acclaimed documentary called 'The Devil and Daniel Johnston.'

CLICK ON THESE WORDS FOR DANIEL JOHNSTON'S PHOTOGRAPHS

CLICK ON THESE WORDS HERE FOR DANIEL JOHNSTON TICKETS AND EVENT DETAILS

Wave Pictures + Stanley Brinks in Newcastle Friday 16th October

2009-08-27T08:08:00.000-07:00

THE WAVE PICTURES

+ STANLEY BRINKS

@: Star And Shadow Cinema, Byker. 7.30pm Friday 16th October 2009, tickets 7 pound, see below
‎

The Wave Pictures: Stalwarts of the UK indie scene, The Wave Pictures have done the following in their ten years recording together:

*Toured with Jeffrey Lewis and Herman Dune as support and backing band

* Played Backing to Mountain Goats on records released via 4ad.

* and the same with Darren Hayman of Hefner

* Peel Session

* Singles on brilliant indie Moshi Moshi

* provoked comparison to the likes of Jonathan Richman, Modern Lovers, Morrissey, Jarvis Cocker and Suede, poked at them by knowledgeable critics.

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS TO WAVE PICTURES AT STAR AND SHADOW

Photographs:

CLICK HERE FOR HI-RES PHOTOGRAPHS OF WAVE PICTURES

Support comes from:

STANLEY BRINKS (Ex Herman Dune, from France)
www.myspace.com/therealstanleybrinks

BLACK CAB CASINO
www.myspace.com/blackcabcasino

Also:

CLICK HERE FOR DIRECTIONS TO STAR AND SHADOW

Portions For Foxes is back!

2009-08-27T08:05:00.000-07:00

It's coming through a hole in the air,
from those nights in Tiananmen Square.
It's coming from the feel
that this ain't exactly real,
or it's real, but it ain't exactly there.
From the wars against disorder,
from the sirens night and day,
from the fires of the homeless,
from the ashes of the gay:
Portions For Foxes Promotions is coming to Newcastle Upon Tyne.

It's coming through a crack in the wall;
on a visionary flood of alcohol;
from the staggering account
of the Sermon on the Mount
which I don't pretend to understand at all.
It's coming from the silence
on the dock of the bay,
from the brave, the bold, the battered
heart of Chevrolet:
Portions For Foxes Promotions is coming to Newcastle Upon Tyne.

It's coming from the sorrow in the street,
the holy places where the races meet;
from the homicidal bitchin'
that goes down in every kitchen
to determine who will serve and who will eat.
From the wells of disappointment
where the women kneel to pray
for the grace of God in the desert here
and the desert far away:
Portions For Foxes Promotions is coming to Newcastle Upon Tyne.

Mp3s of Jason Molina and Lucero live in Newcastle December 2007

2008-02-14T12:43:00.000-08:00

It's a bit of a bugger that I don't have any of these for Caribou or Pelican. but here goes.
a parting gift! enjoy:

Caribou, School of Language, D_RRadio, JayMay, THIS THUSDAY @ Independent

2007-11-19T10:48:00.000-08:00

Portions For Foxes are ultra-pleased to be bringing one of modern electro-pop’s most consistently inspiring acts Sunderland. This November, Dan Snaith, multi-instrumentalist, virtuoso, and most recently. Doctor Of Mathematics, will be warming up our dreary and overly be-Greggsed little city with sunny Krautrock crescendos aplenty.

Caribou’s latest CD, ‘Andorra’ sees Snaith make the hop from Domino Records to Merge (home of Camera Obscura, Neutral Milk Hotel, Arcade Fire etc.) with conquering flair and style. More hooks and chord changes per square minute mark an obviously departure from the looped drones that characterised his earlier work, and led him to rarely be mentioned without a nod to Fourtet but a move into verse and chorus hasn’t meant a move to pop at the lowest common denominator. Something the atomic glow of Andorra’s critical reviews reflects:

‘a multi-layered masterpiece, refreshingly sweet, with beautiful baroque touches’
- NME 8/10

‘Andorra will undoubtedly win Caribou a lot of new fans and rightfully so; it's a big, bold, tuneful collection that impresses with its ambition and meticulous arrangement.’
- Pitchformedia 8.3/10

‘expertly melds experimental electronica with pop sensibilities, a momentous addition to Caribou’s enviable discography.
- Tiny Mix Tapes – 4.5/5

Caribou live is renowned for deploying multiple drummers and synchronised visuals to bring to life the incredible melody filled explosiveness of their tunes. An absolute bargain (seriously) at five quid an advance ticket, with some brilliant local supports and DJs, and free entry to Cool For Cats club night afterwards, we’re even more certain than usual that this one is un-missable.

Click For:

Caribou Myspace

Caribou Official

Recommended for fans of:

Fourtet, M83, LCD Soundsystem, Neu!, Boards Of Canada, Can, Captain Beefheart

Photos:

Caribou Flickr page

Support:

D_rradio

Tickets £5 adv + booking fee:
NOT ON SALE YET!
email us at david@portionsforfoxes.co.uk if you'd like to know when they go on sale.
click here for our ticket store in the meantime

Okkervil River thanks. Simon Joyner in Newcastle

2007-11-11T07:57:00.000-08:00

The party's done, the cake's all gone, the plates are clean.*

and after this past month's relentless to-froing, I have to say I'm bloody knackered.
But then so many people have mentioned how much they enjoyed the gig (and it was incredible if i do say so myself)...that a little fatigue is nothing to moan about.

This was the biggest gig we've done so far and went swimmingly well...

I don't think I've had such a kick looking around at the mass of people one of our shows pulled in since Final Fantasy in October last year. That show had the same sense of satisfaction that comes from watching your best efforts paying off.

as usual there were more than just Rachel and i involved in this one:

Claire Dupree of Narc magazine ran a sweet interview with Okkervil for their November issue...

Jimmy Asquith and Ruth Sleighthome, editors at Newcastle University's Pulp Magazine, made the interview we did with Okkervil their cover story for the week...

Matt Marlow and Katy offered to put the band up in their flat and have my bedroom mattress taking space up there right now.

Scrumpy Willow And The Singing Kettle cafe for driving along a stackload of their incredible Veggie Breakfasts for the band. They also graciously lent us the aforementioned plates.

Minotaurs played a blinder of a support slot.

I'm sure there will be others that I forget. So thanks a ton to everyone involved, and so glad you had as good a time as I did!

I managed to forget to record anything or take any photos. bugger.

SIMON JOYNER @ THE STAR AND SHADOW CINEMA, WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 21st:

In other news, we had to turn down a show with Jagjaguwar/Team Love's Simon Joyner recently, but have found out that he's playing the Star And Shadow Cinema on November 21st anyhow. Score!
Simon Joyner fact: John Peel only ever played two records from start to finish on his show, one of which was a Simon Joyner record, the other was Bob Dylan's Desire.
i think its about £5 a ticket, what a bargain!

cheers,

David / Foxes

O'Death At The Head Of Steam Halloween Party

2007-11-01T16:12:00.000-07:00

to say this show was fun is an understatement of some freakin' magnitude.

let's thank everyone who was involved:
www.myspace.com/freediamonds
www.myspace.com/chippewafalls
www.myspace.com/odeath

Daisy from the Head Of Steam, whose effort in making the place look flash was nothing short of incredible. Rachel Portions carved up some totally sweet pumpkins.
John Egdell of Fake Indie Label did an incredible job with the sound as well as putting the show on with us.

The Devil did a shit hot Djing job too:

more photos as soon as they get developed.

in the meantime, here's some live mp3s from the show:

enjoy!

David

what a mess

2007-11-01T15:51:00.000-07:00

my mate john sent me this vid today.
had me skanking around my room something rotten. awesome.

time we booked some ska methinks
David

Portions For Foxes Presents: Pelican, High on Fire, Priestbird, Wednesday 12th December @ Independent, Sunderland

2007-10-30T10:05:00.000-07:00

Two of the most epic metal giants, High on Fire (Relapse Records) and Pelican (Hydrahead Records) are out on tour in December with the almighty Priestbird and we're lucky enough to have a date of the tour booked at Sunderland’s Independent.

Wednesday, 12^th of December is going to be a night of extreme sounds. If you're into Metal, Post Rock and Progressive music you'll come away from this one grinning with, though indistinguishable from a distance, the skin melted off your face. (guaranteed).

It’s a mere £10 of the door-a bargain for the line up-get your tickets fast!

Reviews:

“[T]he music filled the room with wooly sustain and their encompassing circles of noise seemed to draw the audience together. When I looked up, everyone next to me also had their eyes shut, lost in a connected world.”

-Pitchfork Media

“Northern California's High on Fire…. show there's still hope for a metal band to not only operate according to its own whims, but also produce organic and monstrous music, devoid of bullshit. Working at the fringes of stoner/doom metal, High on Fire-- guitarist/vocalist Matt Pike, bassist George Rice, and drummer Des Kensel-- are as powerful and gargantuan a threesome as metal has produced since the mid 90s.”

-Pitchfork Media

Websites:

Pelican

High on Fire

Priestbird

Picture Links:

Photograps of Pelican

Photographs of High on Fire

TICKETS:

Buy Tickets For Pelican and High On Fire at Independent in Sunderland, December 12th

Portions For Foxes Presents: Okkervil River @ Newcastle University, Nov 8th

2007-10-29T12:47:00.000-07:00

Okkervil River's Black Sheep Boy was one of the most acclaimed releases of 2005.

"Wordy and dense, prone to murder ballads, full of soft strings and Wurlitzers...both violent and bookish; it's a striking, woebegone work that...plays out like the strangest Cocteau movie you've probably never seen," wrote the Chicago Tribune.

Kelefa Sanneh wrote in the New York Times that: "Will Sheff, leader of the Austin indie-rock band Okkervil River, writes like a novelist."

Pitchfork's Stephen Deusner added, "like all good storytellers, Sheff is interested in conflict...and he has the uncommon and perhaps unenviable gifts for speaking fluently through his misery-heavy characters." This underdog of a record even managed to come to the attention of rock icon Lou Reed, who on the MTV Video Music Awards and in the Denver Post pronounced Okkervil River one of his favorite contemporary bands.

With their newest release, The Stage Names, Okkervil River dynamite the walls of Black Sheep Boy's gothic, moss-walled castle from the inside to let in the glaring sun. Where Black Sheep Boy presented a fairytale of dark babbling streams and high distant towers, The Stage Names ¨takes place in an unmistakably modern world, where snowy televisions blast into cheap hotels the spectral images of soap stars endlessly betraying each other, where losers in late-night bars languish to the beat of their favorite songs, where broken-down actresses place their final cell calls from lonely mansions high in the hills.

Riddled with characters real and fake, with true-life biography and brazenly fabricated autobiography, with the relics of high culture and the crumpled-up trash of low culture, The Stage Names is a cinemascopic take on the meaning of entertainment.

Reccomended for fans of:
Leonard Cohen, Leadbelly, Bright Eyes, Lou Reed, Incredibly Eloquent And Vivid American Indie Rock Songwriting

Photographs available here: http://www.jagjaguwar.com/press/okkervilriver/okkervilpress.php

Support:

Minotaurs
www.myspace.com/minotaurs

Anna Ternheim (sweden)
http://www.myspace.com/annaternheim

Tickets are £8.50 adv.
Click here for tickets for Okkervil River in Newcastle

Interview with Will Sheff of Okkervil River

2007-10-28T16:30:00.000-07:00

Given our show with Okkervil River at Newcastle University on November 8th is just around the corner, we got an interview in with singer Will Sheff via electro-post (e-mail).

I asked the questions myself this time, so, ever the narcissist, i injected a few of my own personal existential dillemae regarding myspace, artistic pain, and one, inspired by The Hold Steady line 'Big heads and soft bodies make for lousy lovers' into some of the questions. you can probably guess which ones.

cheers,
David

p.s. for tickets to see one of the absolute greatest bands in indie rock (in both mine an Lou Reed's opinion), click here

How has touring The Stage Names been going, any good anecdotes?

I guess the funniest anecdote I have is when they took Travis into an isolated room at the border into Ontario, Canada and told him, “We’re going to arrest you, so tell us where the drugs are now and we won’t take your van apart.” They went on like this for some time, telling him they were going to arrest him, so he should just make it easier, etc… Then the discussion went into them interrogating him about whether he’d ever used drugs. After about a half an hour, their discussion culminated in one of the men reaching his hand down the front of Travis’s pants and kind of feeling around for a little while. Then they let us go.

So, that was pretty funny.

This is your fourth full length not including various EPs... do you feel like a veteran songwriter these days?

Not really. To me, the word “veteran” – when not used to refer specifically to retired soldiers – makes me think of someone who’s old, self-satisfied, doesn’t have anything new to say. I think if I started thinking of myself as a “veteran” I’d probably develop that whole self-impressed cantankerous old man persona before my time.

Something I’ve been wondering myself lately, your latest record has shed the melodrama that characterised early Okkervil recordings: is angst immature?

Well, pain isn’t immature. Pain, and why we have to be on the receiving end of so much of it, is one of the central enduring subjects of art. I think a big difference is that I hear a lot of songs where the pain seems to mainly stem from complaints like “my girlfriend broke up with me” or “society seems like a bunch of fake robots” or “I feel a vague sense of anguish about life that it’s difficult to exactly pin down.” Those subjects seem, to me, to be immature.

I feel there’s more crocodile tears/ teen angst in pop music than ever now, that there’s a pressure to be ostensibly ‘tortured’ to make credible art

Yeah, exactly. Like you’re not making some kind of deep statement about the world unless you’re wallowing in misery, so you’d better come up with something to be miserable about posthaste. But I feel like there’s a maturity to looking at the world and saying, “wow, there sure are a lot of profoundly shitty things that happen, but I guess that makes it even more important to try to find joy and compassion and kindness and pleasure out there, huh?” than to just run around shrieking “Life sucks!”

Should everyone in the Western World accept that they’ve got it pretty good these days ?

Well, I don’t know if it’s productive for people – or groups of people – to go around trying to compare pain and trauma with one another. I, personally, though, find it comforting at times when I’m feeling sorry for myself to remember how laughably petty my own problems actually are.

There’s this assumption that rock critics can’t make genuinely good music. You were a rock critic once….

I get the sense that you’re trying to bait me with these questions.

I think the belief that rock critics can’t make good music is most adamantly insisted upon by insecure musicians who have had negative experiences with rock critics who resent the fact that musicians are cool and they get laid when the rock critic himself is just hunched over a laptop and a stack of promo CDs, getting more and more bitter with each tappity-tap on the keys. Rock musicians and rock critics share this symbiotic relationship of love/resentment and fear/desire-for-approval between each other and it’s very sweet.

I think that criticism can be a very noble art when practiced by the likes of a Lester Bangs or a Pauline Kael. However, it’s all about picking something apart to show how it works. Creating art, on the other hand, is the opposite process: you’re making something out of almost nothing, and you might even be ignorant about how you’re doing it. It doesn’t necessarily follow that someone who’s good at one thing would be good at the other, though I think it sometimes happens. All the French New Wave filmmakers started out as critics…

You used to author character assassinations of rock stars that should have hung their guitars up long ago for audiogalaxy – when is it pertinent to put the plectrum down and turn off the mic? Do you get to be a rock critic full time then?

I think it’s time to stop doing any art when you’re no longer having fun, when you no longer feel like you’re making progress in a direction, when you feel like there’s no longer something to what you’re doing. Each work doesn’t have to be an utter masterpiece, but it should have something that makes it worth existing out there. There is so much mediocre art in the world and so many talented artists; if you’re no longer having fun, maybe that’s your signal to step aside and give someone else a chance.

In your interviews, you seem to have a libraric knowledge of rock history….how does this impact on your songwriting…

Well, I don’t know if I have a vast knowledge of rock history…I’m really just a fan, someone who takes it all more seriously than perhaps he should.

The new record has a fixation with celebrity. Do you ever think what it’d be like to wake up as someone really famous, like Bono or something? Would you put your publicity to good use?

Bono’s in an interesting position, because he actually has the power to influence people positively by being a role model and a mouthpiece for important ideas, but he also occasionally looks like a total sanctimonious humorless dork for doing so. I don’t quite understand why that is, and I wish I knew. If I were suddenly super-famous, I would probably try some Bono-style heal-the-world shenanigans too, even though I’d probably look even dorkier than he does.

There’s a theme on the new record that deals with the relationships fans make with artists they’ve never met. As an artist, then, how do you feel when you meet fans? Is it a ‘best be polite’ thing, or a ‘fuck you, I’m an insufferable let down, get over it’

I sometimes do feel weird when I meet fans, but not in a bad way. I am extremely grateful to them for caring about the band (I painfully remember a time not so long ago when absolutely no one did), but I don’t know how to express it in words that aren’t just kind of hollow clichés, and likewise I don’t know if they know how to talk to me without just saying things like “I’m a really big fan.” The relationship artists have with their fans can be frustrating sometimes, maybe. You do so much motivated out of love for them, but you can’t actually individually love and know them. Likewise, they respond with love they can never actually give you in the way that people normally give love to each other in real life.

Nerd question: do you think in the age of social networking its easier to know what certain people are going to be like before you meet them? (as someone that’s matured parallel to the rise of myspace/facebook, I always think about how I knew people before I saw their networking profile and afterward…how what they might write about themselves on the internet might colour my opinion of them)

I think it’s far easier to see how they like to represent themselves, and that says a lot about someone, but it’s not the whole picture. And let’s not forget that there’s a huge difference between a series of static pictures on the internet and a walking, talking, three-dimensional person with a tone of voice, a way of speaking, a height that may be different than you imagined, a smell that may be different than you imagined, a way of dressing that may be different than you imagined, etc…

You talked in an interview I read about writing songs about people that were different to you, and the more so, the better. To do that you have to know yourself pretty well, right?

I don’t know. I guess so. I feel like I know myself relatively well, but I’m not sure that helps me to change things in my life.

You’ve been reviewed by pitchfork consistently well, but Uncut and Mojo over here haven’t touched you. Is it just young hipsters at Okkervil shows? you’ve had comparisons to Bright Eyes and I know from experience that young teens turning up to their shows has tarnished their ‘palatability’ for some. Are there any ambitions you have for an audience that are unfulfilled?

Well, Mojo has actually reviewed several of our earlier records, but someone told me that someone in the reviews section at that magazine doesn’t like us and so has deliberately steered the magazine away from covering us. I don’t know whether that’s true or not, so I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt. But you’re right that we’ve been covered less by Mojo than by, to use your example, Pitchfork. Not sure why, and I’m not sure your audience theory quite works because I wouldn’t say we have a specific demographic making up most of our audience. We get young teens, but we also get college kids, nerds, jocks, hipsters, loners, middle-aged music collectors, people who don’t fit into any of those designations, people like you and me.

You’ve talked about being a fan before, but never really specified who you might have been obsessive about in the past.

Well, I was a huge, obsessive fan of the Incredible String Band for years.

Given you don’t like Wes Anderson, twee pop etc. and things that I tend to associate with outsider, maybe intellectual culture, infantilising sexuality I want to play the blonde one off sex and the city and ask: “are intellectuals shit in bed?”

I don’t really understand what the term “intellectual” is supposed to mean. I feel like when people use that term they often use it in a loaded way. Is an “intellectual” someone whose idea of a great time is wrapping their brain around kind of abstract, complicated problems and trying to figure them out? Or is an “intellectual” someone who snobbishly affects more intelligence than other people in an attempt to make themselves look more sophisticated? Since I don’t know what you mean by the word, I’m going to ignore it.

Obviously, there’s a lot of sex that doesn’t have anything to do with the mind. That kind of reptilian brain that takes over when you engage in activities like running in a race or mindlessly, happily driving a car or playing a rock show comes into play more. That said, a lot of sex is in the mind, especially when it comes to ideas about what’s dirty or slightly fucked-up. I think a lot of smart people are great about dirty sex, because they understand what’s so dirty about it and it fucks with their head more. Plus, smart people are fun to have sex with because all their intelligence is kind of beside the point in bed; they may have some distanced understanding of what’s going on, but ultimately they’re forced to just be a body, and that can be frightening for them, or liberating. All of that stuff brings a lot of electricity into sex that might not otherwise be there if it were just dumb bumping and grinding. Which is fun, too, obviously.

more info on okkervil river at the the Jagjaguwar site
and Okkervil's Official Site

Jeffrey Lewis Interview

2007-10-19T05:18:00.000-07:00

while you wait about for us to nab our own (or not as fate may befall) here's a sweet interview with Jeff lewis from drownedinsound.com:

http://www.drownedinsound.com/articles/2494025

cheese,
david

Jeff Lewis @ Bar 19, Durham, Monday 22nd October

2007-10-16T02:25:00.000-07:00

Portions for Foxes are teaming up with the Durham University Alt. Society next week for an evening with Jeffrey Lewis. This guy is the king of nerd-cool who makes his own comic strips and pencilled artwork for his many releases. The most recent being and album made up entirely of covers of songs by the UK anarchist punk band Crass. The current release is appropriately titled 12 Crass Songs and comes with a fold out comic strip documenting the moments in his life that shaped his need to record it.

Already intrigued? Well so are we!

Whilst Lewis is well known for producing homemade tapes of his music and taking a very D.I.Y approach to touring he also holds a masters degree. This seems a perfect combination for the anti-folk artist-a well educated politically minded musician with a punk rock sensibility.

He recently played dates in the UK with Daniel Johnston. Lewis shares a similar sense of sincerity to the troubled artist. His songs are real, raw and blunt, whilst being quirky and humour-laden. This exciting show should attract a enigmatic crowd to Durham’s Bar 19 , and it will span across age groups. This is one to take your dad to, or your younger brother who never got over Elliot Smith.

“All my favorite songwriters are American – Jad Fair, Jonathan Richman and Jeffrey Lewis.” -Eddie Argos/Art Brut

“The best lyricist working in the US today.” -Jarvis Cocker/Pulp

“A more polished effort from the Big Apple’s best-kept secret. NYC’s never exactly lacked eccentric singer-songwriters, but all, from Lou Reed up to Adam Green, would struggle to out-boho Jeffrey Lewis… The likes of “Time Machine” exhibit Velvets-style fuzz, while the speedfreak ramblings of “Williamsburg Will Oldham Horror” show just what makes this comic-book obsessive so unique… Stick with it young fellow – we’re with you all the way.”
NME (8/10)

Picture Links:

Rooftop
Illustrations
Illustrations 2

Links:

Portions for Foxes

Durham Alt.Soc

Jeff Lewis Myspace

Official Site

Live Footage from Parts and Labor @ Independent 5th October 2007

2007-10-09T02:11:00.000-07:00

'It's a fanny'

2007-10-02T13:20:00.000-07:00

Emmy The Great played for us at The Dog And Parrot, Friday September 21st. It was one of the smallest shows we've done in aaaaaaaaages, the last time i'd put a gig on at dog and parrot was a good two years prior....and i think if i remember right Rachel hadn't since last December's Big Scary Monsters tour. it was odd to be back. arrived super tired and stressed, but everything fell into place and Emmy, as well as supports Richard Dawson, Aaron Mcmullan and Sunday School Adventure Club put in a blinder.

Here's a characteristically sharp interview from the show, as written by The Cluny's own Tom Bagnall. enjoy!

David

________________________________________

...As I walk into the dimly-lit upstairs of the Dog And Parrot, the first thing I lay eyes upon is the merch table, laden with CDs, cough syrup, cuddly toys and badges. Because of the darkness and my poor eye sight, I lean down to get a bit closer as I try to make out the curious design on the badges.

“It’s a fanny,” says the girl manning (womanning?) the table, not a hint of a smile on her face, as though saying “it’s a fanny” is the most natural thing in the world to say to a complete stranger. “Ok,” I stutter, more than slightly nonplussed by my first meeting with Emma-Lee Moss, more popularly known as Emmy The Great.

I’m here to interview her prior to her first Newcastle headline show, and I was expecting a quiet, timid interviewee, not someone who will happily throw words for the female part casually into an opening conversation. But once I get past the initial ‘fanny’ shock, I go with Emmy and her guitar-playing cohort Euan (also an artist in his own right, under the name young*husband – check him out) to a kebab shop next door.

I know what you’re thinking, and you’d be right – that is a stupid place to conduct an interview. First off, you have various drunken louts hollering in the background about Bacardi Breezer and who they’ve just fucked behind a skip. Then you have the problem of how to not rile the owners by using their establishment not to line their pockets, but because it’s too cold to do an interview outside. I solve this by buying a can of Coke, which they seem happy enough with.

But perhaps the most pressing problem of doing this interview in this kebab shop is the blaring music – shit dance music, with even shitter rapping over the top. Not only will it make whatever is said rather difficult to hear on my Dictaphone, but it’s also rather off-putting for someone trying to think of witty answers to the same old questions.

“All these lyrics I want as direct quotes,” says Emmy, noticing the over-bearing music. “You’ll be like ‘how did you start making music?’ and I’ll be like [mock butch accent] ‘I’M FEELING HORNY’!”

Which, just to clarify, I don’t think she is. In fact, a rather more pressing emotion is tiredness, because Emmy has just driven herself and Euan up from Manchester, and taken six hours about it (don’t ask).

Driving yourself? Isn’t there someone you can pay to do that?

Emmy: “I booked this tour on my own without consulting anyone, and when it came down to it I was like ‘I’ll drive!’ but now I think Euan regrets me deciding to do it.”

Euan: [without a hint of sarcasm, honest] “Emmy’s a brilliant driver, she really is.”

Emmy: “We got in this road rage with a taxi driver…”

Euan: “His car growled at us…”

Emmy: “I was like ‘fuck you’ and he tried to hit us!”

Euan: “On the lane down the side of the pub, the taxi driver came towards us and Emmy was going ‘it’s one way! Fuck you! Fuck you!’ and starts beeping her horn…”

Emmy: [in fits of giggles] “…it was one way the other way!”

Euan: “And she goes ‘get out and tell him it’s one way’, so I walked up and looked at him – he was a Newcastle taxi driver, and he has a Newcastle football top, and I went ‘it’s one way isn’t it?’ and he went ‘yeah…’”

Emmy: “…and he was going ‘come on then! Come on then!’ It was amazing.”

Euan: “You could have reversed out…”

Emmy: “No, my shit driving meant we won, because I couldn’t reverse out.”

Euan: “He did say ‘why aye’ though.”

Emmy: “And I also kinda fell asleep on the motorway…”

Euan: [shocked] “Did you!? I didn’t know that.”

Emmy: “It was when we were listening to Fantasia, and I was like ‘zzzzzzzzz’. And the weather on the way up was terrible. I called up my manager today and said ‘it’s severe weather conditions, we can’t go’ and he was like, ‘it’s raining!’ I actually thought we were going to die today, because of my driving, and I thought ‘well at least I was quite happy yesterday’…”

So, moving swiftly on. It’s not your first time in Newcastle, is it?

Emmy: “I played at the University, with some girl called Beth Horton Miller…”

Beth Jeans Houghton…

Emmy: “Yeah, her. She wrote me this mental Myspace message afterwards. It said ‘I’m so sorry I was hostile towards you. I was pre-judging you on the way you looked.’ And I was like ‘she didn’t act hostile’, and then I got another message going ‘someone hacked into my account and sent you that Myspace’, and I was like…”

Euan: “…weird…”

Emmy: “…‘what?’”

How was Glastonbury?

Emmy: “Glastonbury was shit. Sound was shit. Our soundman didn’t show up. It rained. What else? My boyfriend snogged my mate. I took acid…I went mad.”

Was it your first time at Glastonbury?

Emmy: “I’ve been married at Glastonbury.”

Properly married?

Emmy: “Well I didn’t think it was, but then he introduced me to his family. I was 18, I had just finished my A Levels, and I got a call from my friend’s dad’s friend, saying ‘come to Glastonbury’ and I was like, ‘alright’. He was about 40 years old, and then he got me really fucked and married me…”

[Long silence]

Emmy: “…but we didn’t have sex…”

What would you describe as your influences?

Emmy: “Have you ever seen ratemykitten.com? Not ‘rape’, ‘rate’.” [descends into fits of laughter again]

[to Euan] “Have you had enough? Do you quit?”

Euan: “Four days of this…I’m cancelling myself! I’m gonna call myself on my own phone and leave a message.”

Emmy: “‘Euan has cancelled his appearance’. But that’s honestly my main influence.”

Euan: “I think Emmy’s influenced by the insignificant things in life, like motorway service stations.”

Emmy: “Yeah! Marks And Spencer…and my horrible life. But I’m not going to get into that. Probably my first influences were pop-punk, and then I realised what I was doing was folk music. I guess now I mainly get influenced by reading books. I wanted to be in a band like Lightspeed Champion are now, but back then I didn’t know anyone who sounded that. So I thought I’d do some songs and wait until I found a band, but I never found a band. I really wanted to be the front girl in the end song of Empire Records.”

But you have your own band now…

Emmy: “I just borrow them.”

Euan: “I’m on permanent loan. From myself.”

Emmy: “But he’s cancelled himself now. He’s void!”

It’s at this point that the interview collapses around itself, through a combination of bad location and frazzled interviewees. Following this ramshackle chat, Emmy and Euan go on to perform a flawless, endearing set in front of a rapt Dog And Parrot.

Out of chaos…

Daughters, Friday 12th October @ Independent in Sunderland

2007-09-30T12:38:00.001-07:00

www.myspace.com/daughters1

North-East Gig goers are in for yet another instalment of energetic noise this October with a feast of a show headlined by the almighty Daughters! Fresh from a stint of dates with The Fall of Troy, this frenetic quintet will be hitting Sunderland’s Independent on the 12^th October to rip it up on a stage with Grizzly Twister and the region’s very own D.I.Y legends, Lavotchkin.

This is another exciting show that takes the Portions for Foxes team back to some their previous alternative promotion projects, working with the likes of Wives, The Hope Conspiracy and Whores Whores Whores.

The most recent Daughters album, Hell Songs (Hydrahead, 2006) frantically flings short spiked tracks at the listener in a way that is both rhythmic and robotic, by assigning the melody of the tracks to their bass and bass drum.

“Daughters' uneasy marriage of Pussy Galore-cum-Locust attitude mirrors what they're attempting on Hell Songs: A unity of two different avant-gardes united mostly by a desire for shock and aural awe. The resulting songs might even work too well-- together, the disparate elements of grind and trashcan-rock come together so naturally that the result is almost conventional, which one has to think isn't really their intent. Forgive them for trying to freak us out: In the process, they've stumbled on to something.”

-Pitchfork Medial

On October 12^th can we expect a selection of tracks from Daughters’ previous releases, including Canada Songs (Robotic Empire, 2003), we can hope for a preview of some of the upcoming tracks that will feature on the release of their third LP, due in 2008.

Pelican, High On Fire, Priestbird, 12th December @ Independent, Sunderland

2007-09-24T15:08:00.000-07:00

We are super excited to announce that we will be putting on the almighty Pelican on the 12th of December @ Independent in Sunderland. For more information on the band and to stream some tracks go to hydrahead.tortugarecordings.com/pelican/ and www.myspace.com/pelican.

Watch this space for full line up details.

That's all for now.

David and Rachelx

Caribou, Thursday November 22nd @ Independent, Sunderland

2007-09-17T13:52:00.000-07:00

‘a multi-layered masterpiece, refreshingly sweet, with beautiful baroque touches’
- NME 8/10

‘expertly melds experimental electronica with pop sensibilities, a momentous addition to Caribou’s enviable discography.
- Tiny Mix Tapes – 4.5/5

Click For:

Caribou Myspace

Caribou Official

Recommended for fans of:

Daughters! Friday 12th October @ Independent, Sunderland

2007-09-17T12:49:00.000-07:00

Yet another instalment of energetic noise this October with a feast of a show headlined by Hydrahead Records (also home of: Pelican, Jesu, Isis, Botch) almighty Daughters! Fresh from a stint of dates with The Fall of Troy this frenetic quintet will be hitting Sunderland’s Independent on the 12^th October to rip it up on a stage with Sweden's Grizzly Twister and the region’s very own D.I.Y legends, Lavotchkin.

This is another showcase for the uncomprimising, cutting edge of modern metal takes us Portions for Foxes lot back to our heady days sticking on the likes of Wives (who are now defunct and have went on to form NO AGE, and recently signed to none other than Sub Pop!), The Hope Conspiracy and Whores Whores Whores.

The most recent Daughters album, the chaotic, swaggering and clinically insane Hell Songs (Hydrahead, 2006) frantically flings short spiked tracks at the listener in a way that is both rhythmic and robotic, by assigning the melody of the tracks to their bass and bass drum.

-Pitchfork Media.com

On October 12^th can we expect a selection of tracks from Daughters’ previous releases, including Canada Songs (2003's more straight up but no less ear-bursting grindcore debut), we can hope for a preview of some of the upcoming tracks that will feature on the release of their third LP, due in 2008.

Click For:

Daughters! myspace

Photos:

Daughters! Press

Recommended for fans of:

The Birthday Party, The Locust, Converge, Give Up The Ghost, Lightning Bolt

Support:

The Grizzly Twister (Sweden)

Lavotchkin

Tickets £7 Advance:

Click Here for tickets

Parts and Labor, Friday 5th October @ Independent, Sunderland

2007-09-13T13:12:00.001-07:00

Brooklyn based Parts and Labor will be bloodying Independent, Sunderland's nose with a noise-anthem suckerpunch in October. It'll no doubt be a hit with the art-rock scene in the North-East. Portions for Foxes are always trying to take a step up from previous success and we're sure a band as boundary smashing as Parts and Labor will give us a push in the right direction.

The band is out on tour in the UK with their fourth LP on Jagjaguwar/Brah Records. Since its release in June Mapmaker has gone down a storm with the likes of Pitchforkmedia.com; describing it as an album of “uptempo noise punk with the irrepressible drums of Chris Weingarten, blurting and squealing keyboards to replace guitars, and the vocals always set to a strident, monotone bellow.” This is an album that offers a fine balance between “Frenetic drumming and counterpoint keyboard squeals” with churning sections of “simmering tension”.

On record this is a band that somehow manages to make distance seem close. It swirls around the room, catching you off-guard from all angles leaving unsure whether to dance around like you are at a punk-rock show or kick-back and float off on a rumbling storm-cloud.

A live performance by this energetic trio is more than likely to have its crowd unable to resist a bit of schizophrenic combustion-and there’s certainly plenty of room to do that on Independent’s sizeable floor space.

click for:

Parts And Labor Myspace

Parts And Labor Official

Reccomended for fans of:

Battles, !!!, Lightning Bolt, Husker Du, Neutral Milk Hotel, Battles

Press Sez:

“Brilliant sustained Noise-Rock…. Minimalists with a monumental impact”

-The New York Times

“Fist-pumping choruses and chaos; the sense of a song not just being sung, but being hurled over the side of a mountain.”

-Chicago Tribune

“What Parts and Labor have figured out how to do, in a way no one else really has, is to make noise anthemic.”

-Pitchfork Media

Photos:

More photos at:
http://www.partsandlabor.net/photos.html

Support:

Tickets £4.00 +b.f. click HERE for tickets

Hi there

2007-09-02T09:52:00.000-07:00

We have joined the Blogosphere. to what purpose is something as yet undecided on, but it ought to develop organically....if we don't get bored of it.

I guess we'll use it as a way to keep publicising our thoughts (maybe even controversial ones) on how things are going and allow a bit of insight into how the music scene in Newcastle and Sunderland is connected up...it was a bit dumb keeping everything on the cool for cats forum anyhow.

we'll stick news of what we're up to, bookings, details about bands we're involved with, goodies, interviews we end up doing and whatever here. should be fun.

there probably will not be any tired old 100 word album reviews or anything.

cheers,

Foxesxxx