The Selecter at Reggae City in May: It's not the same old show

Pauline Black talks racism, sexism, 2-Tone, Ska and Reggae, re-forming your band, keeping it punchy, and not wallowing in black and white nostalgia.

I’m not absolutely sure, but I'm probably the first (legal) radio DJ to put The Selecter on air. We used to do sessions at the old BRMB Radio, recording up and coming West Midlands bands just as they came to the boil. This included UB40 and the Specials, pretty much all in quick succession, in 1979 . It worked a treat: the station scored great listening figures and got to look - very unusually for the old BRMB - hip and cutting edge. And the bands got exposure and MU scale cash. Everyone was happy. It worked. Just saying...

So, back in the day, Pauline Black came in for an interview to tie in with the session. Now, Pauline Black’s on the phone ahead of a string of midlands dates - you'll find them at the bottom of this post. 34 years on, The Selecter is touring again, and a stroll down 2-Tone lane it ain't. Two new albums, new members to go with founders Gaps Hendrickson and Black, a richer mix - and the same fierce attitude. 

Steve Ajao talks and plays on Radio To Go

A conversation with live music from Steve Ajao and Ade Wakelin

This is the second in a series. The concept is childishly simple; making it work right, and sound right, is another matter.  I sit down in the studio with a small group of musicians; they play, we talk. In this session, two much loved Birmingham veterans, Steve Ajao and Ade Wakelin, who regularly play together and accompany each other in their respective bands, came together to play, sing... and talk. 

I've watched Steve play for an embarrassingly long time. A live night with Steve, in whatever line-up he chooses, is always good, rip-roaring fun, played from the heart and the gut. He has great stories, and some forthright opinions to go with his huge gravelly voice, and there's a hair-raising account of the time he was spent spinning down his local High street like a rag doll after being slammed into by a speeding car on a pedestrian crossing. It put him, unconscious and severely damaged, in hospital for a while. He broke a lot of bones, but none, thankfully, in his hands or head. That story, and his protracted recovery, aided and and abetted by Ade, makes for uncomfortable but compelling listening.      

We put this together last summer at Music Up in Coventry, as part of a project brokered by UB40's Brian Travers. So this is part one:

Steve Ajao with Ade Wakelin - In The Studio part 1 

and this is part two:

Steve Ajao with Ade Wakelin - In the Studio  part 2

As always, all the shows I do on Radio to Go are available on request, free of charge, to any station that might like to use them. The only stipulation is that the show must be played in its entirety. I build them to run for about a commercial hour, or between 50 and 55 minutes. So if you're a station - terrestrial, internet, local or far away - and you'd like this show, email me through the blog.

Also in the In The Studio series:Steve Gibbons
360 at the Elephant House

Links

Steve Ajao

YouTube Videos featuring Steve

Albums
Steve Ajao - Pure Evil
Ade Wakelin - Going Down That Road

Urban Folk Quartet; TG Collective. Two GREAT bands. Folk, Jazz, Latin, World. Your call.

New CDs launching this and next month. Shared musicians and connections. Academic rigour, passion and skill. 

New nujazzfolk albums abound in Birmingham this spring. They’re all different, but with common threads. The musicians all work with each other, for a start. Tracking who plays where is bewildering. It’s musical promiscuity of the highest order, and as always with promiscuous behaviour – let’s put this delicately - cross pollination will take place. I think I’ll stop exploring that analogy any further before I get into trouble. 

Both bands here are as much into Jazz as they are Folk. The key is experimentation, adventure, and a lot of fun on the side. The danger is that we take this brave and appealing work for granted. Please, don’t ever do that. Savour it; appreciate it, support it if you like; but don’t take it for granted.  


Urban Folk Quartet

UFQ: Broughton, Trigas, Moon and Chapman

Less than three years ago, UFQ – short for Urban Folk Quartet - didn’t officially exist. Three albums on, they’re one of the guvnor UK folk bands. They set a fearsome standard, effortlessly winning must-book status on folk and festival circuits across the UK and Europe. Teaching forms a large part of their background, the widest of wide musical experiences another, jaw-dropping technical skills a third, and genial enthusiasm and experimentation a fourth. 

I caught their first two gigs – opening for Jo Hamilton at the Glee Club in Birmingham City centre, and their official lunch at the Cross in Moseley. Both were lovely, musicianly, powerful, confident affairs. I loved them, but I wondered then how they would fare. I didn’t have to worry. For a brand new operation, they’ve done really rather well…

“We were quite careful about when we became a brand new operation”, explains UFQ cajonista Tom Chapman. “We probably did a little bit more prep and rehearsal before we started gigging. After our first Birmingham gigs, we headed out to Belgium, Spain and Italy. It’s always been part of the ethos of the band to try and get work abroad. With Joe and Paloma s' histories, having travelled widely and built up some ready made connections, that’s how that part of things came together”. 

It doesn’t hurt that they’re well connected. Joe Broughton teaches at Birmingham Conservatoire, of which more later, and he and Paloma Trigas teach at the Guildhall School in London. Tom also works with Joe for Music For Youth, and at the Barbican in London. So there is a certain academic cast to the band. Frank Moon, the fourth member of the band also teaches, has probably played in more bands in Birmingham than anyone else (of course, maybe you know better) .and is an examiner; and they all teach workshops too.

“Joe and I do a workshop called Folkworld in Devon, which is rather fun. Joe led a group at the Last Night of the School proms, with Music For Youth. They let me play cowbell…  The workshops are all about live music and getting kids going, getting them really excited about music. We don’t use any notated music at all. No music stands… everyone’s standing up ”

Tom’s background includes the excellent Old Dance School, who are also about to release a new CD, and session work with Katrina Gilmore and Jamie Roberts, TG Collective… and a lot of jazz. In fact, many of the nufolk musicians I’ve talked to recently are also seriously into jazz. So this is where I shot myself down in flames: 

Why do you think the Folk scene is so much healthier than the jazz scene?

"Oooh. That’s an interesting one. It depends on how you define ‘healthy’. The jazz scene in Birmingham is amazing; there are so many people playing. It’s harder to create a full-time career out of it." 

Who would you cite as doing really interesting jazz in Birmingham at the moment?

“Michael Fletcher is really good. He runs a night at the Spotted Dog in Digbeth, every Tuesday. The bands that he gets up, every week, are fantastic. He’s a really good example of a graduate musician (from Birmingham Conservatoire) who’s doing really well. And Soweto Kinch, obviously. He’s someone who has managed to have a bit more mainstream success.… “

UFQ’s Birmingham CD launch gig is right at the beginning of the March tour, March 3rd at The Yardbird. While you’re waiting, here’s something from 'Off Beaten Tracks' to whet your appetite.

Rosiña's Story by The Urban Folk Quartet

On Saturday 3rd March, UFQ played a scorching and very showy set at the Yardbird in Birmingham. The crowd? seething and seriously up for it. You don't get that too often with Folk music. Great skill and musicianship I expected, and got; what really knocked me out was the old-fashioned showbiz savvy they built into their show. Haven't seen that since Horslips, ages ago..

  
TG Collective

TG Collective: Barker, Pursglove, Fekete, Slater and Jones

About a month later, the first official CD outing from the TG collective arrives: It’s called ‘Release the Penguins’, and TGC have also kindly allowed me to include some material from it.

The kernel of TGC - Sam Slater and Jamie Fekete - were two thirds of Trio Gitano; when   Sophia Johnson, departed for Western Swing and Country with Toy Hearts, Slater and Fekete settled into a more flexible line-up as TG Collective. 

You’ve got a lot of different people working with you in the Collective. That implies flexibility.

“It’s fairly settled”, explained Sam Slater this week. “We are six musicians. Occasionally we’ll get special guests in, and have fixed deps when we need them.  Depending on our set and venue, we also sometimes perform with Ana Garcia, a great flamenco dancer.”

There’s a degree of musical promiscuity in Birmingham, where people fly from band to band, infecting each other with musical ideas…

“It’s true! There’s a lot of cross-breeding going on.”

And how is it that the Folk/NuFolk/Experimental sector, which you are seen to be part of, is so much more prominent  than Jazz? What’s your take?

“I suppose Folk has always been popular and perceived as more accessible for audiences, from the fifties folk revival onwards… And Jazz has (often unfairly) sometimes got ‘that’ image if people don't know much about it. If you sell yourself solely as a ‘jazz band’, it has to be different. It can’t be just another standard bebop tune if you're trying to do something new.  And you have to be an incredible instrumentalist.  In Birmingham it’s actually going rather well, with the Spotted Dog sessions, Cobweb Collective stuff, Harmonic Festival and Birmingham Jazz.  I don't think we're particularly 'folky', but folk (especially some festivals) now seems to encompass a lot of broader styles all with their own followings – you can include singer-songwriters, world music, and an awful lot more. Even the Destroyers can find a place there”

TG Collective - On The Run

After all this time, this is a first album for TGC. The album was recorded in a cottage in Shropshire, with two London-based engineers, Joe Peat and Alex Merola, both friends of the band, using portable kit.

“They took all the gear in; you could work to your own hours. If you wanted to do something at 2 in the morning, you could. It was a really nice vibe. Most of the material was put down there, with a couple of overdubs in London. It feels… right.  Alex is Uruguyan, so has a different perspective on things, and that added to the mix.  Him and Joe were just as important as musicians in the band, and now do our live sound as well.  Gypsy Jazz is one element, Flamencos’ a second, and Contemporary Classical another ”

And there I was thinking I was going to write up experimental Folk….

“Of course! But it’s quite hard to put your finger on it and say this is what we are”

It’s been a long time coming.

“Yes. We didn’t finish with Trio until 2006, and the Collective didn’t start until later that year. It’s been a while.  It took a year or two until we settled on a line-up that we were happy with. Logistically, recording was tricky. Various band members – there’s that promiscuity thing again - had other projects and family obligations.”

Percussion is a newer element. Players who are part of the collective include Tom Chapman (see above) from UFQ and Joelle Barker from ADO and half a dozen other outfits. Louis Robinson of the Destroyers takes a key role; Percy Pursglove - Jazz lecturer at Birmingham Conservatoire - is now a fixture on trumpet and double bass. 

Release the Penguins - TG Collective  

All this is making me think about the role of the Conservatoire in supplying players, teachers, mentors and musos who have chosen to live and work in town. And the next steps for TGC?

“After taking god knows how many years to produce this album, finances permitting, we’ve certainly got another couple we’d like to do pretty soon. We quite like the idea of having a couple of full band pieces, and then me and Jamie working up two-guitar pieces, but with different guest players on Kora, Sitar… a different recording direction”

Links:
Urban Folk Quartet site  
TG Collective site 

Steve Gibbons talks and plays on Radio to Go

A conversation with live music from Steve Gibbons and John Caswell

I aim to tell stories about musicians from my city on this blog. In this post, however, Steve Gibbons is telling the stories... and how. This is one of a series of programmes I recorded with local musicians last year, working with Brian Travers of UB40 on his Music Up project. 

It’s a simple notion: we get together in a studio, we talk, and the musicians play, live. It’s a conversation with music, and, of course, the programme is only as good as the music and the conversation. Steve has great music and brilliant stories, so this one’s a winner.

I now have the privilege of giving the show a first outing on Radio To Go. But if you’re working on a station that would like to air it, that’s fine too; just read on. I’ve broken it down into roughly two equal parts: part one is right here; part two, now with a Flipcam clip of part of the session, follows on.

Steve Gibbons is one of the most loved musicians in Birmingham. He’s been his highly individual, poetic and articulate self, for nigh on fifty years. If you don’t know Steve, you should. Here’s the Wikipedia page, and here's a fan site.

This show was originally meant for a first broadcast airing on Birmingham Internet station Rhubarb Radio, but since that station fell over late last year, I’d rather not let it gather dust. So, accidentally, but not unpleasantly, this was an exclusive on this blog. However, we agreed at the start of working this series that shows would be free for rebroadcast on any station that would like to have the programme. So, if you’re such a station, email me through this blog (link below) and I’ll get a copy to you.  WCRfm, a community station in Wolverhampton, was the first station to take delivery of this programme for rebroadcast. It aired in February. 

My thanks for to Steve and John, Brian and the team at Music Up in Coventry. And the photo right here? Thank you, Steve Ajao.

There may be more to come in this series. Feedback is very welcome in the meantime. And I am open to suggestions...

Finally, here's a FlipCam shot of part of the session, shot by Brian Travers.



Also in the In The Studio series
360 at Elephant House
Steve Ajao