The game is changing: Goodnight Lenin

Goodnight Lenin want feedback on their new songs. See them in the bar afterwards. Oh, and there's three, count 'em, three festivals to talk about. With the Monkees?

The challenge for all performers is to know when it's going well, and why. That's why I so admire people who make great music. It's not just the uncanny talent. It's the pressure to perform, to deliver. Not only that: you have to work out how it's going: you have to manage it all. 

This blog doesn't just celebrate moments of inspiration and warmth, but also the stagecraft that goes with it. To have the balls to take your visions and dreams out to an audience, to lay it out in public, is one thing. That's where it really starts. That's when the game changes.

Gigs, bands, venues, surprises, changes and some disappointments. 2014 has been eventful.

This is the last Radio To Go post of 2014, tucked into that awkward half-holiday, half-not space between the Christmas blowout and New Year's Eve. 

Some performers are hardily prepping for their NYE shows; many more are slumbering through this interim week before things start to rev up again in 2015. 

So this, as in previous years,  is a good time to look back. All of this is highly subjective. It's stuff that struck me as notable. You will have had different ideas, different joys and pleasures. I'd be delighted if you felt like joining in the debate. 

Gigs of the year contenders

By Richard Shakespeare - crowds at Mostly Jazz     

There were LOTS. We've had so many excellent bands, new venues (see below), and most nights, especially most weekends, we've had a ridiculous choice. I particularly enjoyed:

- Boat To Row's single launch gig at the Old Joint Stock Theatre, 28 Feb
- Miles and Erica at the Hare and Hounds, 22 May
- Brothers Groove at the Jam House, 22 July
- Pretty much everything at Moseley Folk, but that's much more of a social gathering in the sun anyway.
- Everything and everyone at this year's Songwriters Cafe: 9 fantastic house concerts which ran on Thursdays from September to November

Earbleed of the Year

Prince at the LG Arena, 19 May 2014. Atrocious sound and dangerous volume levels. I can take one or the other, but not the two in combination. It actually hurt to listen. This was a shame, because Prince delivered, in parts, a killer show. This audio shambles was thrown into sharp relief by the very good sound the same PA delivered for Laura Mvula, who gave an excellent, excellent opening set.

Venue thoughts

I am so pleased to see developments underway at the Dark Horse, now part of the same company that runs the lovely Prince of Wales, both in Moseley in Birmingham. I'm hoping for big things. 

Props too, to the lovely people at Ort Cafe, who have crafted a super intimate acoustic venue in Balsall Heath. 

The guvnor Birmingham place is still, of course, the Hare and Hounds. Two years on from the last development scare, things seem to have gone quiet on that front. However, the threat has not, to my knowledge, receded. Things will not be rosy until venues know where they stand. For that to happen, our beleaguered and broke council must, once and for all, establish and then respect the principle that if an established and effective venue exists, new owners who wind up adjoining that development must recognise and respect that. 

So, property developers: do the right thing and build in effective soundproofing. And on that note, a big welcome back to the Fiddle and Bone, which reopens in 2015. Let's also celebrate the continuing success of the Asylum venues.

Unexpected pleasures

A few nice things/events which caught me unawares and delighted me:

The Stacks at The Wagon and Horses, August. 

The Stacks are from Nuneaton/Leicester way, so I hadn't seen them before they supported the very likeable Broken Witt Rebels. Stacks were sharp, tight and inventive. They attracted a posse of admiring girls as well as the usual coterie of hard-rock boys – an audience combo that's always a good sign for guitar-slinging wannabe rock gods.

'5-Star Review' on Erica Nockalls' EN2 album. In the middle of a set of artfully crafted hyper-musical noise terror you'll find the sweetest love song ever. Fabulous. More on this album here. 

Dan Whitehouse and Chris Tye's Christmas song. Just great. Two huge talents, and a good cause. It's available here and there's a blog post here on these guys.

Record Store Day - silly activities in a good cause. 
Probably because I grew up in the vinyl era, I still really can't get excited about music distributed on vinyl – especially the fetishising of the medium. But if it helps preserve independent retailers who are passionate about music, I'm all for it. Here's what Goodnight Lenin did

'Mighty Hard Time' on Ruby Turner's 'All That I Am' album: 

Ruby just gets better and better. Quality, seriously deep old-school soul, a fine perspective, no compromise whatsoever, and focus like you've never seen. Proud to know her and proud that she's from Brum. There's an interview here.

The Spoken Word

This happened by accident. I'm so happy it did.

Once in a while I get asked to voice something for, say, an album project. I'm normally happy to do this – it's just nice that my voice is remembered from my prehistoric radio days. But this year's outings were quite different. 

Firstly, a radio producer I greatly respect and admire, and who moves in very different circles from me most of the time, asked me to voice a bit part in a radio drama. Rosie Boulton, who now works independently after a long and storied career at the BBC, has produced a sweet and elegant one-hour play, 'The Kindness Of Time' which is online for anyone to listen to, for free. So this was work with a script, bouncing off a different voice actor, cooking up the relationship, working in a very different studio to the ones I'm used to (C-Mat in Handsworth), and it was both a challenge and a lot of fun. More on this here.

Then the wonderful and very different Layla Tutt developed her multi-media Song Of the Woods project and invited me to voice. I got to play a great romantic lover and a very satisfying baddie. It was lovely.

Finally, I voiced for James Summerfield's latest project: a set of poems written by local author Darren Cannan. Some are set to music, some are fully arranged. The book and ep are out imminently. Everything I've heard sounds fabulous. Then again, I'm a fan of James' work, and I thought Darren's writing was terrific. So I am privileged and excited to be a part of this.

And as you can see from this trailer, I'm in good company.

The JB's book!

Another book worthy of your attention, partly crafted by another person I greatly admire: Roy Williams, who helped run the legendary JB's in Dudley from the very early days. A near-forty year span of time in rock history, seen through the eyes of the team who ran one of the best-loved clubs in the Midlands. Stories, memories, extraordinary facts and figures. 

You won't believe who played there. Nor will you believe what they got paid. There's a detailed post in the works. In the meantime, you can find out more, here.

Bad news

Dying Orchestras 

This was announced last week in Denmark: a kickstarter campaign... to try to keep an decent orchestra in existence. I hate this. Orchestras should be part of our cultural mix. We need that reservoir of talent; we need that pathway to a music career for our promising musos. We need to keep celebrating demanding and experimental work. But all over the country and all over Europe, funding taps are being turned off. The Ulster Orchestra is under severe threat too.

Steady progress department

- The wonderful Cadbury Sisters, scoring loads of love from Radio 2 and a vinyl release on RAK records; 
- Brothers Groove, also scoring R2 love - and a gong at the British Blues Awards 2014;

- Another milestone for the excellent Katherine Priddy, who sold out at Kitchen Garden Cafe. Her first headliner and her first sell-out. Well done the Prldster.
- Electric Swing Circus went fully pro and toured the world. Bravo!

Albums

Laura Mvula's Orchestral CD was startlingly good and confident. Not that I was in any way surprised.

Goodnight Lenin - In The Fullness Of Time
Out now. It's lovely. At last! 

Ruby Turner - All That I Am
So good, so clear, so focussed. 

Erica Nockalls - EN2 As above, but in a wholly different music realm. But I think Ruby and Erica would get on like a house on fire. 

Dan Whitehouse - Raw State
Dan revisits some of his older songs with a fresh perspective, and by golly, it works. This kind of approach doesn't always work, but in Dan's case – oh boy, does it ever. Moving, warm and powerful. 

Chris Tye - The Paper Grenade
Go Chris! Tye simply gets better and better. Super stuff from one of our best.

Hopes for 2015: Music

I'm eagerly anticipating the next set of songs from Goodnight Lenin.

I would so love to see the rancorous dispute between UB40 and their former lead singer resolved. Ali left, noisily, some years ago. Now, equally noisily, he is fronting a rival operation and aggressively laying claim to the name of the band that he, let us remember, actually left. This does nobody any good, least of all the remaining members of UB40, who picked themselves up and set about damage limitation on several fronts with courage and dignity, not to mention solid musicianship. All this demeans and cheapens a noble name.

I hope for good things from among others, Chris Cleverley and Harriet Harkcom.

Otherwise? I hope to be enchanted and surprised by more fresh and wondrous talent. That's certain to happen - just don't know when.

Hopes for 2015: Broadcasting

Auntie
It's no secret: I would love to see more national BBC output generated from the Midlands, to reflect the talent we have in abundance. Who knows? Only the BBC, and they ain't telling. Again.

The rise of the hybrids. 
New media, new platforms. It's coming, and when it gets into gear, this could be a game-changer. The keys? Cheap tools for one, but what is essential, mission-critical in fact, is clear and precise strategic thinking. Put that together, and things will change, and faster than anyone expects.

Local Television
After an embarrassing set of stumbles, we are, finally, due to get a local TV station in February next year. It will, now, largely be run by local professionals who understand television, which is a good thing. I wish them all the luck in the world - because they will need it, and a lot more besides - and humbly suggest that they take a good hard look at the wealth of videos on offer from local talent. 

Have a wonderful end of year. 

See more posts on venues, posts on broadcasting and posts on music business on Radio To Go

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Festival horror stories: when the headliners pull out the day before their gig

Taking care of business at festivals and gigs you promote is one thing. Keeping a weather eye on your own band's business? Tricky. Now do both, all at the same time.  

Fellster: not a hair out of place. Um.  

As of today's publishing date, it's three weeks until the final day of Moseley Folk 2014, and four weeks on from the end of Mostly Jazz Soul and Funk. I'm quizzing John Fell about all of this, and on the band he plays in, Goodnight Lenin, and the final final final release of their first album, later this year. He's not unbusy.

Timing is a tricky thing. Planning festivals is a year-long process. Right now, John's looking at possible acts for 2015. And he's working on the next gig for Goodnight Lenin, in three months, to tie in with the album release. So he's juggling time scales.

If that's tricky, consider the perspectives he has to navigate. A great many bands (and artists, producers, writers, broadcasters and bloggers) get so close to their projects that they wind up missing what audiences might value. I'm not saying that's a bad thing – it's part of the creative process, is all.

But it does raise issues of marketing what you've got. That means you have to look at it, see yourself as product, all that. It's not an easy process. Given that, John Fell is in a pretty unique position. Wearing his festival organiser hat, he's in a position to weight those factors up in other acts. He has to monitor the market to see who's around and who's coming up. He has to judge the audiences for the different days of both festivals and Lunar, the Nick Drake-themed festival he also works on. . 

Critically, he has to step beyond his own purely and intensely personal sentiment to judge whether the music Goodnight Lenin makes has its own independent life once he and the band let it out into the public realm. 

So, quite a lot on the Fell plate. And that's before your headline act cancels on you at a day's notice. But we'll get to that.

Especially with Mostly Jazz, Funk and Soul, I'm seeing a shortage of headline acts... And maybe there's a weakness at Mostly, being so very US-oriented. There's a lot bands coming over, doing the Festival circuit in the UK and Europe. And there's an absolute ton of festivals. So maybe there's not enough talent to go around?

I think a lot of festivals now will pay way over the odds to get an exclusive, to make a difference. So their act does them and not just one of thirty dates in Europe. Neutral Milk Hotel at Green Man – that's an example, the Gene Clark Band at End Of The Road… they're earning big money, stupid money.

Moseley and Mostly can't do that.

No, we can't. So what we've got to do is to keep it varied, so the line-up's exciting. So that people don't know what to expect. We did that at Mostly Jazz with King Khan and the Shrines. I was most excited about them because I knew people would go away loving it. And I knew that no one would come to the festival just to see them. That's the card we're playing.

You had a bit of hiccup with the Earth Wind and Fire show cancelling on you at 24 hours notice.

Ahhhhh.... I got in Friday night after working from 5am that day. Looked at my emails at 1am Saturday – just to check – and it said 'Earth Wind and Fire Experience cancelled'. So what do we do? Less than 48 hours away, and it was our marquee name as well.

We didn't really sleep that night. So I went to do the Saturday work...

...in at 5 again?...

...yes. While trying to book another band. Which we did. And then getting the flights sorted, getting the contracts out, getting the backline, getting the hotel. Getting the money wired. All that.

A Family Stoner    

You got the Family Stone, which is kind of the same level, given that it's not the original line-up. There wasn't a Sly, but EWF didn't have Maurice White either.

Exactly. In my opinion it was better, but the only downside was that we'd had them two years ago. It kind of made for a really good feel, because everyone clubbed together. This has happened. Here's a surprise. It was a story. People like gossip, people like a story.

And, unusually, you went public with it.

Funnily enough, it gave it a buzz. No-one know what was going to happen. That was exciting – for everyone else, not the organisers! And in the end about seven people contacted us to complain, out of the 2,500 who were there on the night. Lots of people on Facebook were more excited about the Family Stone.

Where were they?

In Belgium. We had to fly them in.

You were over a barrel. They could have really screwed you financially.

They could have. But we were helping them out too – they had a couple of spare days, so rather than just sitting there in Brussels, eating chocolate, they came to us, cut their costs and got paid. There were two or so other options. So we got stupid lucky, really.

So it worked. And you had your other legendary names. Ginger Baker. He kinda has... a reputation... that goes before him.

He does! If he'd have turned up and been nice, shook your hand, been all sweet, I'd have been really gutted. He has that legend, and he lived up to it. He was brilliantly horrendous.

And I notice you're looking for acts for 2015 already.

Email me!

Photo: Richard Shakespeare

Now, looking forward to the end of this month with Moseley Folk, there's some nice marquee names.

The biggest we've ever booked: Waterboys, Richard Thompson and Johnny Marr, in a park in Moseley. That's pretty cool. Advance ticket sales are up on last year - best we've had at this stage.

What about the new talent that you give a leg up to? That's what I find most interesting; that's what I want to catch, above all. I'm hoping to do another post, like last year's, on the new talent people miss if they show up late.

That's all happening now. You won't see them listed on the posters. We've got most of them sorted. It's nice to give them that opportunity, the ones that are bubbling up. But you need to look in the other places apart from the main stage and the Lunar stage. And they can say they played Moseley – which is great if it's their first time.

So let's talk about Goodnight Lenin. Last week I put up a post which charted the 50 most-viewed local acts on YouTube. It's complicated and geeky, but it is a very rough ranking of popularity for those acts who have gotten videos out in the past three years. Midnight Bonfires, your support act at the Hare last week, actually scored better on the chart than you. I find that surprising, given your band's position.

We haven't done that many videos, and we've pulled most of them.

Well, that could explain your score. Why did you pull the videos?

When we did our first videos, we just finished then, and then realised that we were looking like a band we didn't want to look like. So we've had to stop until we got it right. We weren't ready. We put our stuff out there, and as soon as we did, we were over it. We've had to go away and scrap the album, probably twice. Wrote ten songs, scrapped them, wrote another ten songs, scrapped them... We kept writing until we got the sound, until we've got to the point where we want to be. And we've done that now. We've changed as a band.

OK, here's an awkward question: why didn't you put a first album out, bish bash bosh, quick, down and dirty, just to let people know you were there? You'd have still grown as a band from that point onwards.

You know what? As we did the first EP, which we put out...

…. which a lot of people really liked....

… thank you! But we instantly went 'No' between ourselves. To do that with an album... A debut album is your first shot. It's really important. Now, we'd have been really unhappy of that was our first effort. Now is the time to say to everyone: Listen! And now we've got six or seven new songs ready, which are the best things we've done.

I've got to ask: you're managing three festivals a year, you're working with This Is TMRW, and you're in Goodnight Lenin. How can you be fair to everyone? Is anyone suffering?

No, not really. It's a good balancing act. The band's not suffering. There are times when I won't make a TMRW show because there's a band rehearsal or a gig. Now we've got these little projects happening which will fund the next step, and so on.  

Lots to look forward to, then. The Goodnight Lenin album, In The Fullness of Time, comes out on the 24^th of November. The band play a major show at the Institute on the 28th. And those new songs? John's right – they're belters. 2015 could be a very good year.

Links

Goodnight Lenin website
Moseley Folk website

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Goodnight Lenin: 17 hours, 2 studios, 2 finished cuts, 1 7 inch.

This is about doing it differently. It's also about Record Store Day, the annual Indie record store bash where 700 UK stores – yes, there still are that many – celebrate their independence, and, often, survival. 

This follows on from last week's, on the Album format. If artists are using the format the way last week's post suggests, Indie record stores are where you'll need to go to get them. 

On Record Store Day, a world of lovingly prepared, unique and mainly indie collectibles will be on sale. Pressing runs will be insanely limited. I really can't see any acts gaining financially: it's done to highlight a retail sector which supports independent artists, sometimes in very difficult trading conditions. 

On Sunday 23rd March, Goodnight Lenin were in Birmingham's Highbury Studio to cut two songs for Record Store Day. The tracks were mixed at Artisan; all done in under 24 hours, with a limited 7" vinyl run to come from the results. The songs? vintage Crosby Stills Nash and Young. The band's many reasons, along with session photos, exclusive rehearsal audio and the finished articles are after the jump. 

This Is Tmrw: New bands, new music, new promoters

For some time I've been thinking of writing about how promoters work. But I haven't got around to it. Why? partly because it's complex and secretive - and not everybody operates, shall we say, fairly. Few promoters will offer up financial details, obviously, and that's something I'd really like to write about. 

So I am grateful to Julia Gilbert and the This is Tmrw team for stepping up to the plate - and we didn't really discuss money anyway. Like musicians, promoters do gigs for different reasons. Here's two teams taking parallel directions with different approaches. Both of them share some problems and have some solutions. Both are idealists. One team does it for love; one for love and, with a bit of luck, money. Both are important to the music infrastructure of the West Midlands. 

Spoonfed by robots: What do we get from music streamers... and what do we give?

Step aside, Radio. The web is the hot way to get new music. Or is it? How we relate to music and performers isn't a commodity you can easily exploit. 

2010 Facebook traffic. Look - that's me, Liking The Destroyers

A question: where do you go for new music? I follow tipoffs, or I catch a promising support act; I dig around. I use the web, but I'm not happy.

I rarely get any leads from radio now. After decades listening to people putting themselves before the music, or relegating music to filler status, there’s only a few shows I can stand to listen to. In truth, that's probably how it should be. 

And it's fun following my nose to live and local new stuff, before it becomes product. There are inventive, fresh performances to discover, played to interested audiences. Do this, and you’re a grassroots part of something unique, priceless and intangible, that’s at the very core of the music industry. That's what this post is all about.

Moseley Folk. John Fell would like a 30 hour day, please. And no hangovers.

2013 Festival season #4: Three weeks out from Moseley Folk, with four hour Goodnight Lenin rehearsals, This is Tmrw work and solo gigs to juggle…

Courtesy Skakeypix

John Fell is ridiculously difficult to get to in mid-summer. It’s not his fault – this is the halfway point between the two Moseley festivals, and he has segued from Festival booking team chores to stage manager, senior bottle-washer and soother of fevered muso brows. He has – hopefully - helped clear up after Mostly Jazz, while setting up for Moseley Folk. His band Goodnight Lenin have a slot at the Festival, clearly set on delivering something special ahead of a much delayed album release. So that means lots of rehearsals as the band shifts to a more raucous, punchier approach. 

And on top of this, weeks before Moseley Folk, John also signed up for solo gigs supporting the redoubtable Patty Griffin. Then there’s the gig with This Is Tmrw. So it’s been a struggle to pin the boy down. But I bet lots of people say that.

Boat To Row: on tour in May, back at Moseley Folk in August, new songs to unveil, and national airplay

The May 2013 Boat To Row tour poster

Boat To Row have been sculling through peaceful waters for some time now. But it hasn't been plain sailing (and that's quite enough boat gags). Time to talk managers, repertoire, accosting national DJs on the street... 

Two or three years back, Boat To Row opened for Goodnight Lenin at a packed Hare and Hounds, rammed with GNL’s mates. That BTR line-up played an understated but highly effective set, swiftly followed up with some early material online, much of which is still current.

This band is astonishingly calm, collected and at ease. They're good company. For all that, there’s been a hefty turnover of musicians, but the current line-up seems stable. And there’s a really rather attractive tour coming up at the end of the month – the Birmingham gig packs in the wonderful Chris Tye, the fast-rising and very appealing Cannon Street and at least four other acts, on top of Boat To Row's headlining slot. And two days ago Moseley Folk confirmed that they will appear on the first day of this year's festival.. . 

And beneath all that sunny affable calm, there’s a good deal of judicious thinking going on.

Juggling tasks: John Fell

It's been a busy year for John Fell, and it doesn’t look like slowing down any time soon. 

The band he plays in, Goodnight Lenin, have packed in a ton of gigs, including tours of Scotland and, this week, Ireland, supporting Beth Jeans Houghton and the Hooves of Destiny.

Tracks for the first album are now in the can; mixing is underway. There are winter gigs to plan for, including a hometown Christmas special. Before that, a string of releases are due, including a live EP. And in addition, it’s been a frantic summer of booking acts for Mostly Jazz/Funk and Moseley Folk Festivals, as well as the Lunar Festival. 

So - a busy man. On top of all this, he's also championing new talent, such as Katherine Priddy. 

For those who don't know Goodnight Lenin yet... they are a hugely promising five-piece, all from Northfield in South Birmingham, who, pretty much, have all known each other since childhood. They are cheerfully happy to be seen as anything but modish. The music is folk-rock, strong on harmonies, with definite nods to giants of the 70s like Neil Young. On stage, they ooze relaxed goofy charm - in fact their gigs are generally a hoot. But their strong suit is a terrific portfolio of songs, which you can explore by checking out their YouTube pages and on their website. One song, 'Wenceslas Square', is embedded here, and it's an absolute gem; you'll find it further down the post. And, for all their knockabout live appeal, the band has the ability to reel off breathtaking numbers which stop you in your tracks. 

What makes things more interesting is John Fell's role within the Mostly/Moseley festivals group, where he is events manager and has responsibility for booking most, if not all of the acts. It's a tricky balancing act to pull off. 

Goodnight Lenin at Moseley Folk 2012. John Fell second from left :-)


First things first. You’ve been recording for what seems like a long time. What’s the release schedule?

We’ve got a single, and an EP – a Live EP – planned before Christmas. The album will arrive next year. The album’s pretty much recorded. We did it on analogue tape at Highbury Studio. It’s the way we wanted to record. So you get that warmth, and it also means you work in a certain way. When you’re recording digitally, you know you can fix anything. It feels a little bit like cheating… But our music is on 16 tracks, with some stuff bounced down (combined on one track), and that’s how it’s going to stay.

Is that a good discipline?

It’s great. It really tests us, because we do like to layer and layer and layer. We might put up five sets of strings on it. Then we need to add our harmonies, so it really is tight. It’s great for us, because we do get that warm, live feel; we’re all looking at each other – you can tell when we’re all grinning. It adds something to it. But we are going to get that digital side too, because all the tracks have been converted to digital for the mixing. 

The single is out at the end of October, and it’s being mixed by John Wood, who did a lot of work for Joe Boyd back in the day. 

Vintage names from the heyday of Brit folk-rock!…Do you sometimes feel you were born thirty years too late?

We’re quite content where we are! It’s just what we listen to. There’re artists from the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s that people still listen to. We want to be the band from 2012 that people listen to in thirty years’ time. 

Talk to me about finances – there’s a lot of stuff to pay for here.

Finances? it’s tough. Obviously, most bands at our level – in terms of where we are release-wise – don’t get 400 people to a gig. So that’s unbelievable for us. But then we’re still financing the band. We’re putting in £40 a month, each, and that pays for our practise room. 

So you are still funding the band? No rock and roll lifestyle yet? 

Absolutely. We don’t take any money from the band at all. It’s all done for the love of it. 

 But you’re getting a name…? There has to be some light at the end of the tunnel?

We’re getting looked at. Some producers - names we’d never dream of - have checked us out. There are publishers and labels looking at us. We’re happy to stay with Static Caravan, who released our last EP. If a bigger label came along to give us that marketing push, we’d be happy. But we still want to do everything ourselves. If we make any mistakes, it’s down to us. We’ve had a few sync offers come along, which is nice, bit I’m very wary of all that, especially if it means losing publishing rights. I don’t mind doing one-off non-exclusive deals where we keep the rights in the long run, but that’s not the way most sync deals work. I don’t want to be the guy sitting in the pub at Christmas when my Christmas hit comes up, knowing I’m not getting anything for it.

Are we talking about 'Wenceslas Square', maybe perhaps….?

Well…

About Wenceslas Square… would you mind telling me how much you paid for that very wonderful video?

It’s a difficult one. The person I did that video with would have charged a lot more. I could tell you that the puppets and the puppeteer cost a thousand pounds. And there were twelve people working on it. It took a year to make. Does that give you an idea?

So, not cost-effective whatsoever?

Not yet! But there were a lot of favours done.

Let’s sum up: The band’s had a good year. Lots of lovely new songs, a growing audience, you’ve reinforced your standing; if I was still programming at radio in Birmingham, I would happily be playing your stuff; I can't understand why people don't… and yet and yet, and yet – it’s all to play for in 2013, and there’s not a precise plan yet. It’s almost like you’ve casually surfed into this position on the back of your songs and onstage appeal…

I think that’s fair. In terms of the band, we’ve done everything we wanted to do. Next year, we’re going to step up. But we’re not in a rush. Bands who are in a rush just bang stuff out.

So Moseley Folk is done and dusted; I thoroughly enjoyed it. But you’re in kind of a tricky position, as you book most of the acts. So you are... a gate keeper: people have to come to you for a slot. How do you keep everyone happy?

You don’t. I’m picking the acts, but I’m picking for the Festival. If I have a friend, and I don’t think that friend’s very good, I can’t give him a slot. If some industry person is looking for some new talent, and I have a bad reputation for bias, they’re not going to respect my choices. So when I book people, there’s no favours being done, it’s people I genuinely think will go over well.

There’s more talent emerging than you can fit onto the slots you have.

With local bands, some people, you see them once, and they’re in. I don’t care about their Facebook page. It’s what they do live. 

How much sleep do you get when you’re doing the Moseley events?

I’m up about 5, putting the last things together… and I go to bed about 2 the next morning. I stay away from the afterparties… until Sunday. And Goodnight Lenin played on the Saturday as well. You know, I'd planned to sleep for a week after the end of Moseley Folk 

Did you?

Of course not! 

And the Christmas show has been announced now. Tell me about it. 

We’re back at Birmingham Cathedral, which we sold out last year. We're not sure about support. I’ve got a few ideas. There’s this new girl I’ve found. She’s mind-blowingly good. I’m kind of... helping her, not being her manager or anything. She’s just 17, so she’s got a lot of choices. I’ve just told her to speak to me if she needs some advice.

That’s highly creditable. 

But it’s what I love doing. 

Katherine Priddy at Moseley Folk 2012 - picture Richard Shakespeare


 The ‘new girl’ John Fell has found is Katherine Priddy. She made her Moseley Folk debut in the Acoustic tent on Sunday, in the middle of the afternoon, and it pretty much felt like she owned the place after two songs. I talked to her last week after a support set in Birmingham. She plays a mix of originals and material from Nick Drake, John Martyn, and some more contemporary songwriters. 

It’s rare to find someone so new digging so far back into the golden age of British Folk and Folk-Rock.

I was brought up on a mixture of Led Zeppelin and Frank Zappa! … but also John Martyn, Richard Thompson… I really really like that sort of music, and so I decided to follow it myself. My dad used to sit around and play those songs, so I chose to to do that tool. He played one song in particular – John Martyn’s 'Golden Girl' – which made me decide to try to teach myself guitar. 

How many gigs so far?

Not many! This is probably the first that people have paid to see, with me as a named support. Moseley Folk Festival was probably the first ‘big’ gig.

So now you’re writing, writing, writing… who are you using to bounce your songs off?

John is good! Lots of people, really. I upload a lot of stuff on YouTube. I got some good responses, and now have quite a lot of subscribers; they’re quite dedicated, and give me some very honest feedback and critiques. I met John by chance at Lunar Festival. I kept sending songs over to him on Facebook.

Next steps? 

University, hopefully! I want to keep on playing for the sake of playing. If it did go somewhere, that would be lovely, but if it doesn’t, it’s a lovely hobby to have. 

Goodnight Lenin website and full gigs list
Katherine Priddy on Facebook

Micro-festivals and New Folk. The Old Dance School and Goodnight Lenin: lots on their plates

Goodnight Lenin on a jetty; Old Dance School on the run

The web has rewritten the way we hunt out new music, not always for the better. For a start, there's no road-map. Of course, that could be a good thing.

Old-school record shops have been crushed and swept away; their online replacements throw 'priority' acts at you. You have to step past that, and that is where I particularly miss the old way of doing things. 

But instead we now have the power to endorse and recommend, and this works in a lot of different ways. It’s changed things. Online momentum can build worldwide for any act that is able to reach an audience. Ironically, one of the music genres that have gained most from this is one of the oldest: folk music. There’s been a huge resurgence in folk and folk-associated forms in the past ten years. Singer-songwriters are coming to the fore again; new bands are enjoying success to rival the 70s veterans.

And this is, I think, down to three factors.

Marketing: 
Bands build great, direct, online relationships with their followers through the web. It’s powerful and personal, and especially suits music people can get passionate about.

Technology: 
Equipment has never been cheaper, and, especially with acoustic instruments, musicians have far more scope to record and distribute their own music in their own way. So, creatively, that frees musicians to do what they feel is right, rather than what a record company exec thinks is right.

The electronic oral tradition: 
Folk and world music has always spread by the passing on of songs from person to person, down the generations and across borders. That process used to take years; now it happens in a heartbeat.

Robin Beatty and Laura Carter are founder members of the Old Dance School, who mix things up with a vengeance. The new album, their third, 'Chasing the Light', is just out. The first album worked in some distinctly non-trade grooves in with the guitars, fiddles, recorders and percussion. 

Laura: "The first album ('Based on a True Story', 2008) had one piece we called the drum and bass section. We’ve moved away from that. Now we’re focussing on all the instruments, rather than the rhythm section. "

From The Air by The Old Dance School

You seem to be using textures a lot more 

Robin: "All folk music is very modal – it’s all open positions of the fiddle, whistles in D. But we’ve got a trumpet in B flat, and a bagful of whistles and recorders. We’ve had loads of fun moving through different keys in different sections of a song. It’s been really interesting."  

Three albums in, where you find yourselves? Is it progressing the way you think it should be progressing? 

Laura: "In some ways it’s been a lot harder for us, because we’ve come from nothing. You start off doing gigs for not much money, and then you have to work on your own profile. Maybe it’s gone a bit slower than I anticipated. We’ve been together for five years now. But in the last two years we’ve been pushing ahead. "

One of the reasons we’re talking is to follow up on a post from the beginning of April, which noted how much radio play West Midlands bands were getting, especially on Radio 2. 

Laura: "We’re doing really well with radio plays on the new album. We’ve gotten a lot more interest from festivals… "

Robin: "We seem to have a good loyal fan base now, which is nice. But we may even have missed out on one or two things this year because we’ve been so – focussed – on our music and the album."

Ras al-Maa by The Old Dance School

Discussion shifts to the web, the power of the Facebook share, and on Spotify and Last-FM, the user playlists and the prompts from the programmes themselves. 

Robin:" Having all this stuff recommended to you… the discoveries that are fed to you on the internet… You do come across some great things. I just hope that it doesn’t extinguish that hunger for exploration that you have for music. That is one of the biggest joys on music. Being oversaturated and overfed with all these recommendations – I wonder if it extinguishes your desire to explore.  "

 That’s more than fair, and something I hope to dig in to in a later post. But back in the present, Old Dance School have further fish to fry. Now, they’re also doing a festival. Robin Beatty comes from high in the peak district, where the Edale Festival will take place. Delivering this has meant years of discussions with the council, clearance for campsites, staging, power and more, wrangling for support funding and so on. But, weather permitting – Robin admits to being a bit ‘gripped’ by all this – Edale gets underway halfway through the month (18^th to 20^th May), with a very strong West Midlands presence, including the Destroyers, Joe Broughton’s Conservatoire Folk Ensemble, Abie's Miracle Tonic, and of course the Old Dance School.

Across town, Moseley Folk are also lining up their first Camping weekend festival too. This one’s called the Lunar Festival, and it takes place in Tanworth in Arden, two weeks later, over the first weekend in June. Old Dance School are also on this bill, along with Scott Matthews, Boat To Row, Ben Calvert, the Young Runways, James Summerfield, Friends of the Stars (recently blogged about here), Bonfire Radicals, ChrisTye… all of whom are local to the West Midlands.

Setting this up is the indefatigable John Fell from Goodnight Lenin, who also play.

Why is Moseley Folk doing this, given that the organisation already has two very successful but labour-intensive operations going in the city already? 

John Fell: The only thing that Moseley Folk doesn’t have is camping! Obviously we don’t want to make it exactly the same as Moseley Folk, but we do want to keep the same sort of friendly vibe, but to bring that camping element in as well, so it becomes a little bit more of a holiday, than just a day-by day set of shows. 

But it’s tiny this first year, right? 

"It would be interesting to find out if it is the smallest festival in the UK! It’s got a capacity of 500 each day. So yes, it is minute. We wanted to start in a small way, and grow from there." 

But you’ve got room to expand? 

"Oh yes. The fields round the site are vast… "

If I wanted to run a festival, I think I’d be declared insane. You’re already in the business, so that doesn’t apply. But how, exactly, do you go about it? Where do find a friendly farmer, for a start? 

"You need the right venue. That’s key. You need a reason to do it. You can’t just say ‘I’m going to run a festival to make money’… "

Because several festivals have cancelled this year already… 

"You can understand it. There are so many festivals that are the same, that offer the same, on the same weekends. "

And prices aren’t going down. 

"No, they’re not. That’s one of the issues we want to address. With Moseley, we try to keep it at around £79 for three days, which is fair. Tanworth is going to cost £65 for four days music – you can camp for five days if you want! "

But with only 500 paying customers a day, you’ll be very lucky to break even… 

"We’ve worked it to break even. This is to try running a new event. We got offered a nice venue, which was perfect for our interests, where we could try something new. "

For our interests…? 

"It’s where Nick Drake spent most of his life, and where he is buried, two minutes down the road from the festival site. This is what I mean about not doing a festival for money, but doing it for an idea. A beautiful plot of land, and the associations with Nick Drake – and it all clicked. Over the last twenty years or so, he’s become more and more iconic." 

Now that’s interesting. Back in the day, Nick Drake was not exactly a huge commercial success. Island Records certainly believed in him. Old hippies like me have memories of rootling around in the bins in record shops – remember them? – and coming across Bryter Later and Five Leaves Left. But, to me, the buzz wasn’t – really - there at the time. Now, it certainly is. And I think that credit has to go to the Moseley Folk organisers for riskily putting their money where their personal interests lie.  The bill is pretty impressive too, and most of the acts will be performing at least one Nick Drake song.

So give me a quick update on Goodnight Lenin? 

"We’re still recording, at Highbury Studio, where we were always meant to be. It’s great. To record analogue tape live is fantastic. I’m a song writer – I’m not technical. I write the song, bang it out, it’s done. So the delicate intricacies of digital – it’s very unreal for me. To just walk in the room, crank up the amp and play the song… it’s the way I want to record.  We’re never going to go back (to digital). You lose a lot of warmth. You lose a performance." 

Hmm. Now there’s an idea for a future blog piece…. But that sort of brings me, full circle, back to the start of this post. It’s ironic that folk, the most basic and direct form of music has flourished because of digital and web technologies. The Goodnight Lenin video above has jumped into people’s awareness… and that could not have happened ten years ago. But they still want to record their music the old way.

Band Links
Old Dance School
Goodnight Lenin