John Davidson, Shane Booth & Ros O’Meara bring together dynamic and contrasting instrumentation and vocal arrangements. The group have an expansive acoustic soundtrack blending guitars, fiddle, bouzouki, percussion and 3 part harmony arrangements to create a world music folk styling that the group call Atlantean. Soaring melody lines, dirgy, intense a capella vocals and complex rhythmic structures will have the blood pumping through even the coldest of auditoriums. The cua live experience has been compared to the melodic intricacies of Planxty combined with the harmony skills of Crosby, Stills and Nash.
cua truly pride themselves on their diversity, with subtle nods to many genres, whilst keeping a folk, world, roots and traditional line throughout. All members are multi-instrumentalists and are inspired by many aspects of the musical spectrum including roots, blues, gospel, jazz fusion, traditional, neo-classical, bluegrass and more. Their approach to music is inspired by the history, landscape and peoples of the Atlantic areas.
cua have been recognised on a european and national level following their first two successful studio releases. Their new 15 track album, Songs of the Hollow, truly captures their distinctive sound and energy and is currently receiving critical acclaim. cua are receiving national and local radio airplay in Scotland, England, Ireland, America, France, Holland, Italy, Denmark, Switzerland and Germany. The group are recipients of a creative Ireland grant and have shared the bill with Andy Irvine, The Furey’s, Hazel O’Connor to name but a few.
“So I’ve stopped wondering and now simply enjoy Songs of the Hollow, an album of variety and of voices, of echoes and of influences, and of emotions and passions.” – Richard Hollingum, folk radio UK
“…harks back to the peak of traditional folk with a slightly blues-rock edge, a more energised version of Pentangle meeting Free’s Fire and Water, and of course developing into a gripping contemporary Irish trad mould” – Remy, thebestofmusicandfilm.blogspot
Experimental live music and Baroque-pop mash-ups; gender-twisting visuals and gothic
storytelling: this new work is an exploration of ‘the Doppelgänger’ – devised and performed by
a pair of real life doppelgängers.
With an uncanny blend of European 1630s-inspired retrofuturism and 1930s wrestling,
DoppelDänger explores the boundaries between self and other, gig and theatre, and questions
representations of femalehood on stage.
Eugénie Pastor and Shamira Turner are associate artists of award-winning Little Bulb Theatre.
After years of being mistaken for one another, they decided to lean into it, heavily. Together
they are She Goat, interested in blurring the territories of theatre and music, extravagant
multi-tasking, and reclaiming what it means to be two women on stage.
DoppelDänger Trailer:
Quote:
“The highlight comes in She Goat’s DoppelDänger, two artists linked and the limbs and
singing…strange compositions, like Björk’s dissonant combinations of simple vocal melodies
laid out with humour over complex sonic productions.”- The Wire, Jan 2017
Nick Capooci is a classically trained piano maestro. He is a prolific composer and his arrangements of Bach’s preludes are a delight. He cites Jimmy Yancy and Thelonius Monk as his major influences. He will be joined by guitarist Tony Hudd and by Clive Fletcher on the double bass. Another great evening of Jazz in prospect.
Dub Knights presents the Dub Poets Society
An evening of Dub classics old and new and spoken word poetry.
Blessings from the Pastor, special guest appearance from Ghetto Priest,
Live PA from Passion (free copy of Passions album for the first 20 through
The door) music provided by the Dub Knights DJs.
Another fantastic psychedelic folk night at the Tom Thumb!
If you came to see Kavus Torabi, Arch Garrison and Bovril in April, you’ll know that these nights are very special. This next show will be no different.
VÄLVĒ is the outlet for composer/performer Chlöe Herington’s (Knifeworld / Chrome Hoof / Lindsay Cooper Songbook) compositional work using text and image as the starting point for scores. She collects sounds and diagrams, composing predominantly for bassoon, saxes, electronics and found sounds to explore synaesthetic memory and collective experience.
The band has been morphing – from what originated as a solo project, performing mainly in art galleries, it grew to include Elen Evans on harp. After moving from from galleries back into music venues, they were recently joined by Chlöe’s Chrome Hoof comrade, Emma Sullivan on bass, microkorg and vocals. VÄLVĒ are now three! Live, the music traverses the realms of noise and improv into songs, punctuated with found sounds and eases into spacy soundscapes.
They have recently closed the Barn stage at Supernormal and been played by John Doran on BBC R3’s late Junction.
STEF KETTERINGHAM Ex-Shield Your Eyes guitarist and vocalist, Stef Ketteringham utilises electric and acoustic guitar, four-track tape recorder, bass drum and scant vocal flourishes.
Improvisations based on skeletal structures, the constant redefining and re-experiencing of compositions is mirrored in the fluidity of the techniques used to extract sound from the instruments. The frenetic, swelling clusters of notes and percussive rhythms snap open from the tipping point of total dissonance to heart-wrenching melancholic melody; neither de-, nor re-constructed, abstraction and melodic clarity shifting focus in constant flux.
For this music is THE BLUES – in the truest sense of a joyful, melancholic expression of the ineffable existential condition we find ourselves within, rather than a stylistic exercise in genre convention. This is a highly personal, subjective language being used to express everything that THE BLUES is of.
LILY of THE GRAPHITES Lily Buchanan, singer and guitarist of the South London based pop punk band The Graphites will play a series of folk songs inspired by her recent intrigue into collecting sea fauna.
Birmingham’s original punk group The Prefects had been part of The Clash’s ‘White Riot Tour’, recorded a couple of Peel sessions, released a 45 on Rough Trade and, years after splitting up, had a retrospective CD released by NY label Acute Records to all round glowing reviews – from Rolling Stone to webzines.
The Nightingales was formed by a few members of The Prefects following that band’s demise in 1979.
Described in John Robb’s definitive book on post punk (“Death To Trad Rock”) as “The misfits’ misfits” and comprising an ever fluctuating line up, based around lyricist/singer Robert Lloyd, the Nightingales enjoyed cult status in the early ’80’s as darlings of the credible music scene and were championed by John Peel, who said of them – “Their performances will serve to confirm their excellence when we are far enough distanced from the 1980’s to look at the period rationally and other, infinitely better known, bands stand revealed as charlatans”.
The group recorded a bunch of critically acclaimed singles – pretty much always ‘Single Of The Week’ in the music press – and three albums, plus many radio sessions for their great supporter Peel. They also regularly toured the UK and Northern Europe, as headliners and supporting acts as diverse as Bo Diddley and Nico.
In the late Eighties the Nightingales stopped working but, following the occasional gig between times, they re-grouped in 2004.
After fucking about with various part timers, starry eyed wastrels, precious sorts and mercenaries the group arrived at it’s current line up, which features Lloyd, Andreas Schmid from Faust on bass, ex Violet Violet drummer Fliss Kitson and on guitar James Smith, who Lloyd had spotted playing with Damo Suzuki.
Since restarting the group have been more productive than ever – releasing six 7″ vinyl singles, two 10″ EPs and six studio albums, touring England, mainland Europe and USA numerous times, playing various festivals and recording many radio sessions along the way.
Until recently the Nightingales made one record for a label and then moved on. They continue to operate with no manager, booking agent, publisher, et al. They work equally well with pop musicians, rock n rollers and the avant garde. Independent, maverick, diligent, daft, blah blah.
The band’s latest releases for their new mates at Tiny Global Productions, are a six track 10” mini album “Become Not Becoming” (2017) and a 7” 45 collaboration with the great Vic Godard in May 2018 – “Commercial Suicide Man”.
Later in the year a new album, titled “Perish The Thought”, will be released with an extensive UK/Euro tour to coincide.
Gecko is a North London based artist, his playful lyrics cover the big things in life; think iPhones, Libraries & Guanabana fruit juice to name but a few.
Gecko has previously appeared at Glastonbury, Bestival, BBC Radio 1, 6 Music, BBC Scotland, BBC London & the Edinburgh Fringe.
In November 2017 he launched his debut album ‘Volcano’ with a sold out London show, a session with John Kennedy on Radio X and a tour of Sofar Sounds shows across the UK and the Netherlands. It was made ‘Album of the year’ in the Morning Star.
He has shared stages with the likes of Ed Sheeran, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, Robin Ince, Josie Long, John Hegley & Billy Bragg.
‘It made me instantly happy when I heard it’
Huw Stephens
BBC Radio 1
The all star lineup in support comes from National Scottish Poetry Slam Champion and 2nd in the World, Daniel Piper. He will be reading selections of his brand new book ‘Arbitrary and Unnecessary’ & if that wasn’t enough new Margate resident and World Poetry Slam Champ Harry Baker also joins us.
Videos:
Gecko ‘iPhone, Therefore I Am’: https://www.youtube.com/w
Gecko ‘Rapunzel’ https://www.youtube
Daniel Piper ‘The Wrong Side of 25’ https://www.youtube.com/wa
Daniel Piper ‘Survival Rap’ https://www.youtube.com/w
Harry Baker ‘TEDx Exeter’ https://www.youtube.
Young Actress Murdered At The Tom Thumb Theatre!
Rising star Carina Harris was murdered during an unscheduled rehearsal for an upcoming play. Now it’s up to the director of the show to determine which of his temperamental cast members is dramatic enough to be a killer!
Purple Dreams Productions are delighted to present this murder mystery ‘The Empty Stage’. Tailored specifically to each venue, this unique play is sure to get the audience guessing whodunit!