By skamonic
We had another terrific location for the wedding gig we played yesterday.
Yet again we were in a historic building. This time a 15th century manor house Birling Manor very close to Beachey Head.Indeed you could see the lighthouse from the very beautiful grounds.
Best of all was the selection of sausage and bacon sandwiches that were served between our sets.We hope to post some photos late when we have more than a mobile connection.
We had a great time, and were happy to help give Adam and Ellie a great party on their wedding day.
By skamonic
UPDATE: Some feedback from the bride “Thanks so much for the music it was great. Lots of people came and told me how much they enjoyed the band”.
We had a great gig yesterday, playing for a wedding in the heart of the City.
The venue was the Stationers’ Hall. This dates back to 1673, and is the home for the Livery Company for printers and stationers.
We rather doubt if it’s very splendid hall has ever reverberated to the sound of ska before, but we had a lot of fun -and the number of people dancing suggested the guests did too.
We were followed by the London School of Samba who certainly kept the energy levels high.
There wasn’t much chance to take photos, but here’s a few that give some flavour of the hall.
By skamonic
We had a terrific gig at the Ritzy last night. It’s a great place to play as it’s a smallish room with a good sound system and an engineer who knows how to use it.
And we got a good crowd – friends of the band, friends of support act the Tootones (great set, guys) and quite a few Brixton locals who just fancied an evening of ska.
It’s always fun to be be able to play two sets too. That means we can vary what we play a lot more and give our soloists a chance to play out a bit more. We were lucky enough to have ace tenor player Dan Berry guesting with us last night as Leah was involved in preparing for her sister’s wedding. He and Steve made for a fantastic partnership as they play a lot together.
So we had a great time, and the energy most of the audience put into dancing suggests they did too.
The only bad thing about Upstairs at the Ritzy is that it is upstairs – and carrying amps up three flights of stairs is a bit of a pain.
But if it wasn’t a big old cinema, then they wouldn’t be able to our name up outside along with the films. (You can click on these for the full picture.)
By skamonic
We had a fun gig at Streatham’s White Lion last night – a really good warm-up for our longer gig at Brixton’s Upstairs at the Ritzy tonight.
As Nick had a gig in Harlow, we were lucky to get Annie to guest on trombone.
We took a few pictures at the sound check and while we grabbed some food before playing.
By skamonic
Our April 7 gig at Madam JoJos has been cancelled.
Shame.
By skamonic
Here’s early notice for two gigs on consecutive nights in South London.
Cue the inevitable joke about waiting months for a gig then two come along together.
April 15th
White Lion Streatham . This is a charity gig for www.music4children.org
April 16th
Upstairs at the Ritzy
The cool thing about about playing at the Ritzy is that you get your name up on the big sign outside where they normally put all the films. Its not quite having your name in lights, but it’s pretty close.
We’ll have more details nearer the time.
By skamonic
We had great fun at Guanabara on Wednesday.
It may not have been the best attended gig we have ever played, but it’s a great venue to play in as there’s a good stage and a brilliant sound system complete with a great engineer.
There’s a good dance floor too, and we certainly managed to get people on their feet.
By skamonic
We are playing at top London Brazilian venue Guanabara on Wednesday October 30th.
It’s in Covent Garden, and there’s more about the venue here.
We’ll be playing one set fairly late.
By skamonic
We’ve got a new Zoom H2 recorder (well, actually a refurbished one off Ebay).
It had its first try-out at last Saturday’s gig.
We thought we would share a couple of tunes via the blog.
But first a health warning.
We simply stuck the recorder on a mic stand in the middle of the stage area.
The sound the band hears on stage has very little relation to what the audience hears out front.
This is because the horns and vocals are being projected by the PA. On stage we have monitors for these, but the sound can’t be too loud or we would get feedback. That’s a particular problem with the vocals. Not only was Veronica the furthest from the recorder, but the horns, who are naturally louder anyway, were much closer.
No bass, drums or guitar go through the PA so they have to be loud on stage so that they project with the PA into the audience. The recorder was also close to the drums and bass.
And of course any commercial recording is carefully mixed before issuing. You can’t do that when you just stick a microphone up in the middle of a band.
So if you’re prepared to use lots of imagination to imagine what the sound was like on the dance floor, here’s Man in the Street. This is one of the 60s ska original instrumentals we play, so the very quiet vocals are not a problem here.
Next up is our version of Kylie’s Can’t get you out of my Head – this is one of our bonkers covers.
By skamonic
We played the last of our summer wedding gigs yesterday somewhere between Stoke Poges and where the M40 leaves the M25. Once again we were joined by Joe on drums who was as tight as usual.
Sri Lankan food
The venue was a marquee. Our PA is fine for such events, though wisely a temporary dance floor had been installed as the ground was a bit uneven, and people prefer to dance on something smooth and solid.
But this is a gig we will remember for the food. The bride is Sri Lankan in origin, and so was the food.
Here’s the band tucking in.
tucking in before we played
Steve certainly enjoyed it.
Thumbs up from Steve
It got too dark to take any further pictures after this (and we had some music to play), though it would have been good to get some shots of the packed dance floor.
But once again we proved that ska can cross every boundary to get people dancing.
