We’re going back to Bethnal Green’s Sebright Arms on Saturday December 15th to play a Christmas gig.
Once again we will be playing with 70s revivalists the Electric Cucumbers.
Doors at 8:30pm and just £5 for an evening of seasonal retro-goodness.
We will have to work out some some cheesy ska cover versions with bad puns for titles.
Any ideas?
Here’s an account of the whole evening with some nice words about us – and this splendid picture.
We had fun playing the Ritzy in Brixton last week.
So did the audience from the amount of dancing that went on.
We played our version of Chariots of Fire – which of course is now Chariots of Ska – for the first time – and revived our version of Dr Who which we haven’t played for ages.
This is what I think we played. And there are some photos below.
Guns Of Navarone
Latin Goes Ska
Double Barrel
Mambo Number 5
Mood For Love
Can’t Get You Out …
Enola Gay
Price Tag
Chariots Of Ska
James Bond
Dr Who
99 Red Balloons
Tainted Love (Vocal)
Gangsters (Vocal)
We had a great time playing at a fund raising event for a Jamaican charity last Saturday.
This was held at the Jamaican High Commission (the equivalent of an embassy) just by London’s Royal Albert Hall – and a rather grand Victorian building too.
It was something of an honour for a British ska band to be asked to play in the High Commission, and to be honest we were a little nervous. A carpeted reception room with no special lighting is perhaps not the ideal conditions for a gig, but perhaps helped by lots of rum punch, it turned into a great evening, with lots of dancing.
We’ve had a lovely message back from the organiser:
Awesome! Amazing!
You guys are just amazing.
I cannot get over it.
Cannot.
You were such a hit.
I hope we can grow together because this isn’t the last of Mangia!
Please give the Band my special thanks.
Perhaps even better was what was said in the ‘thankyous’ speech at the end of the evening:
“If I had been walking past in the street I would have had no idea that this was bunch of white people – they were playing with such energy.”
The Italian/Jamaican food was also rather special.
We were also told in no uncertain terms that we should not call it ska – with a long a as in ‘art’ – but with a short a as in ‘ass’.
Here are some photos we took:
We’re playing Upstairs at the Ritzy on Friday October 12th.
This is one of our favourite venues, and is becoming our regular south London booking.
Though when they say it is upstairs, they speak the truth. Hauling gear in does involve several flights of stairs.
We will be sharing the bill with the fabulous Astrojets.
They play a terrific mix of 60s music from the USA – a bit of blues, a bit of soul, some surf and lots of R&B.
They are also lucky enough to have our guitarist Frank in their ranks.
It’s likely we will have some new material to throw in.
The gig starts at 8pm, and it costs just £5 to get in.
We’re playing Upstairs at the Ritzy on Friday October 12th.
This is one of our favourite venues, and is becoming our regular south London booking.
Though when they say it is upstairs, they speak the truth. Hauling gear in does involve several flights of stairs.
We will be sharing the bill with the fabulous Astrojets.
They play a terrific mix of 60s music from the USA – a bit of blues, a bit of soul, some surf and lots of R&B.
They are also lucky enough to have our guitarist Frank in their ranks.
It’s likely we will have some new material to throw in.
The gig starts at 8pm, and it costs just £5 to get in.
Someone shot some video of Rudy from the audience at our June gig at the Sebright Arms.
We’ve edited it together with our own sound and some video from our cameras.
It’s not the best quality or performance of the evening so it doesn’t make our official video collection. But as it’s the only video taken from the audience, rather than the side of the stage, it would be a shame not to use it. And it’s a pretty cool sax solo too!
[tube]GLJwEl9JSBQ[/tube]
We’ve had a nice message after the wedding we played in Dorset at the weekend.
I think we touched gold.
You guys were brilliant, and exactly what we needed, tight with a great repertoire.
We will highly recommend you again, and possibly use you again for ourselves too.
Take care for the future.”
We enjoyed it too. Weddings are nearly always a fun gig as people want to have fun and expect to hit the dance floor.
… or is it teepee?
We had a terrible journey to what turned out to be a great gig near Dorchester in Dorset.
It was lucky that we had all set out in good time, as a combination of torrential rain, and endless bank holiday traffic hold ups meant that it wook hours longed than we expected to get there.
However once we were there it quickly became an immensely enjoyable evening.
The reception was in a giant tent constructed from two tipis. We had enough time to set our equipment up and sound-check.
We were also able to provide our PA for the wedding speeches and to use for the first dance and disco parts of the evening – courtesy of the groom’s ipod.
Most exciting for us was the debut of Nick’s new blue plastic trombone.
Astonishingly it sounds pretty indistinguishable from a traditional brass instrument. But it’s a shame you can’t get them in a 2-tone black and white check pattern.
This is what we played. One highlight was one of the guests proving to be an accomplished rapper to Skaravan. Whether Duke Ellington would have approved is another matter …
| First set | Second set |
| Guns of Navarone
Latin goes ska Double barrel You’re wondering now Mood for love Alley cat ska Fly me to the moon Can’t get you out of my head Enola gay Price tag Tequila
|
James bond
Misirlou Skaravan Ten out of ten 99 red balloons Tainted love Rudy a message to you My boy lollipop Baggy trousers Israelites Night boat to Cairo Gangsters (vocal)
|
We had a fantastic time playing at Round Midnight a couple of weeks ago. We just haven’t had the chance to share before due to holidays.
We think this was one of our best ever gigs. It was certainly one of our longest at about two and a half hours of music.
This is what we played – though not quite in the order below as we swapped a few things around.
| First set | Second set |
| Chinatown Guns of Navarone Latin goes ska Double barrel Mood for love You’re wondering now Eastern standard time Alley cat ska Man in the street Mambo number 5 Fly me to the moon Can’t get you out … Enola gay Price tag |
James bond Work song Skaravan Tiptoe 10 out of 10 99 red balloons Tainted love Rudy a message to you Tequila My boy lollipop Monkey man Baggy trousers Israelites Night boat to Cairo Gangsters Chinatown |
It was the first time that we have ever played Mambo Number Five – one of the key hits in the 1960s mambo craze from Perez Prado. Most people are now much more familiar with the Lou Bega song, but we went back to the original instrumental for our instrumental version.
There’s a short video of Gangsters that Round Midnight uploaded to Facebook. You can see that on our Facebook page.
And here are a few photos we took from the stage.
