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Restless Natives Festival hits Glasgow - May 9th-15th 2016!
Multi-disciplinary event, Restless Natives Festival, is set to make its mark in Glasgow next week running from 9th-15th May 2016.
Already confirmed to appear at the festival are Wu Tang Clan's Ghostface Killah, Law Holt, Future of the Left, Rolo Tomassi plus many figureheads of music and film via various post-screning pre-recorded and live Skype Q&As like Scottish writer, director and the UK's leading satirist Armando Iannucci, Fugazi's Ian Mackaye, The Death of "Superman Lives": What Happened? director Jon Schnepp and producer Holly Payne and many more...
The festival will to showcase the best in music, art and film with a range of screenings, gigs and other events that aim to bring people together in and around the East End of Glasgow, generating income for the local community, bands and charities, but it also aims to promote ethnic diversity and gender equality throughout the program.
Restless Natives is reflective of a truly modern DIY ethic that showcases talent from a broad spectrum, mirroring the diverse talent the creative scene has to offer.
All events will be individually priced as affordably as possible to ensure accessibility for people from all economic backgrounds and the organisers will also be donating a portion of gate receipts towards specially nominated East End charities to help their community.
A timetable and brochure are available to download now via the Restless Natives website!
A number of film events have already been confirmed including a screening of In The Loop with an exclusive pre-recorded Q&A with writer, producer, director and satirist Armando Iannucci, a screening of Instrument plus a Q&A via Skype with Fugazi’s Ian MacKaye, The Skinny presents Couple In A Hole with live Q&A by Geoff Barrow (BEAK>, Portishead) and Billy Fuller (BEAK>, Robert Plant Band), The Room featuring exclusive behind-the-scenes documentary and live Q&A via Skype with Greg Sestero, Song, By Toad presents The Ambiguity Of David Thomas Broughton with exclusive unseen footage and Restless Natives’ own national exclusive of Blood, Sweat & Vinyl : DIY in the 21st Century starring Neurosis, Godspeed You Black Emperor and ISIS (the band!) with live Q&A via Skype with director Kenneth Thomas and A Page of Madness with an exclusive live original score by Adam Stafford. Plus special guest-curated screens by Scottish Refugee Council in association with Take One Action Film Festivals presents Salma, Africa in Motion, the Scottish Mental Health Arts and Film Festival and Radical Film Network Scotland amongst others.
The festival also boasts a strong music line-up including Wu-Tang Clan’s Ghostface Killah, LAW, Cardiff's alt rockers Future of the Left, Sheffield mathcore champions Rolo Tomasi, Canadian composer Tim Hecker, electronic maverick Blanck Mass, Chicago favourites Into It. Over It, US cult heroes The Hotelier and Glasgow’s own Tuff Love, United Fruit, Happy Meals, Spinning Coin and Lightwave. Full details of further showcases, film nights and talks programmed by Hotgem Music, Nightschool Records, No One Knows Records, Winning Sperm Party, Stretched, Fuzzkill Records, Nice n' Sleazy, Bloc+Music, Song, By Toad and Struggletown are also set to be announced very soon.
Restless Natives Festival will take place May 9th - 15th 2016 and tickets are available via the Restless Natives website.
Outblinker’s ‘The Remains of Walter Peck’ EP out now!
"...Glasgow's standard quo rejectionists..." - Spin
"...as blissful as they are boisterous." - NME
"...it'll latch onto your lapels and drag you into a claustrophobic abyss." - The Line of Best Fit
"...slick, modern Kraut for an uneasy Britain...." - The Skinny
Outblinker have released their EP The Remains of Walter Peck, out now via Stabbed In The Back Records and available to buy via Bandcamp.
A successful campaign has seen support range from SPIN who premiered the free download track 'Farrokh Bulsara' and described it as a "Frankenstein-like musical creation", The Line Of Best Fit who premiered the video for title track 'Walter Peck', Clash who excusively streamed the EP and The Skinny who scored the record 4/5.
'Farrokh Bulsara' is also available to stream via the band's Soundcloud now.
You can also stream the video for 'Walter Peck' via Outblinker's Youtube channel.
Quite simply Outblinker “play music and aim to improve your life thusly”, but with the release of The Remains of Walter Peck the band wanted to explain the experiences that led up to their new EP:
Fame is just so fucking futile. That's the thing about being an outsider. You accept your fate. You know that 50 years from now a bank won't be butchering your work to flog mortgages to suckers. You make your noise and you watch it echo for a bit then dissipate. Like our protagonist, Walter Peck, your ashes are gradually diluted by a planet of dirt and your music even more rapidly subsumed by the white noise of the world.
In many ways, Outblinker owes it's existence to Walter and certainly this EP would never have been recorded or co-written with Benjamin John Power (Blanck Mass/ Fuck Buttons) were it not for Mr Peck's unifying influence. His friendships, a chance meeting, a jar of human remains and a table of beers. It's a long story. Suffice to say he'd suggest we enjoy it while it lasts.
The product of a musical pilgrimage to record in a medieval church on a remote island in Orkney, these three songs are a precursor to Outblinker's debut album (due October 2016) and a tribute to the transitory, fleeting nature of everything we seek to build and accomplish. All the beauty, all the greed, all the pride and all the fucking politics. Given long enough, none of it will last. And thank fuck for that.
When the lights across the planet finally go out for the last time and all the MP3s evaporate in microscopic puffs of electrons and all the CD's lie scattered across the land like the scales of some huge, extinct fish: what then for all these idiotic fucking pop songs? And what then for the Bach and Simone, Mercury and Mingus?
Nothing. That's what. Sweet anonymity. Sheer oblivion.
And as time marches on ceaselessly into that eerie, silent new era, none of those chart anthems will mean any more than the centuries of forgotten folk music, decades of shitty demo tapes or the deluge of vacuous, ironic, indie shit currently sloshing around. How will Virgin, Warner, Universal and Sony trick kids into buying their cynical, hollow bullshit then? Especially when there are no kids left to fleece.
Art is for now so eat your fill. You're not taking it with you and ultimately there's no point leaving it here. Walter Peck taught us that much.
The Remains of Water Peck by Outblinker is out now via Stabbed In The Back Records and is available to purchase on Outblinker's Bandcamp page.
The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer release single ‘Don’t Make ‘Em Like They Used To’!
"...like The White Stripes having a bar brawl with B.B. King." - Cougar Microbes
“...a real blues kitchen with all sorts of ingredients in the pan.”
- Pop Matters
Canadian duo The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer have released their latest single Don’t Make ‘Em Like They Used To out now via Tonic Records and available to buy on iTunes.
The video for Don’t Make ‘Em Like They Used To premiered on The Blues Magazine and it is also available to watch via the band’s YouTube channel now.
The duo combines the classic blues rock sound of Willie Dixon but with a modern edge akin to Jack White and The Black Keys. Together, the pair have created a their own take on the genre, smothered in greasy, gritty soul and imbued with and injection of funk.
The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer are Shawn Hall (lead vocals, harmonica) and Matthew Rogers (guitar, drums, backing vocals). The two met and bonded over music whilst at a recording session for a radio jingle and named their new project after the blues harp reference lyric “I took my harpoon out of my dirty red bandana” from Kris Kristofferson’s Bobby Mcgee and the term “axe” as a common reference to a guitar. Since then, the guys have gone from strength to strength with the release of their debut album The Blues Can Kill in 2007, the widely acclaimed Checkered Past in 2011 and most recently, A Real Fine Mess in 2014.
The two-piece have already received praise from the likes of Exclaim!, Pop Matters and The Blues Magazine amongst others. They have also been nominated for Blues Album of the Year at the Junos in 2014, for multiple Maple Blues Awards and won Blues Act of the Year at the SiriusXM Indies in 2013. With an already impressive list of live shows behind them, including performances at Montreal Jazz Fest and sharing the stage with Taj Mahal, Booker T Jones, David Wilcox and Mother Mother, the band have recently completed their first ever European tour including dates supporting the fantastic Dr.Dog.
The Harpoonist & The Axe Murderer’s latest single Don’t Make ‘Em Like They Used To is out now via Tonic Records and available to buy on iTunes.
Me And My Drummer + We Are The City confirmed for The Great Escape!
We're extremely pleased to announce that Berlin-based electro pop duo Me And My Drummer and Canadian alt-rock three piece We Are The City will be making their way across the pond for Brighton's esteemed The Great Escape Festival from May 19th - 21st 2016.
Me And My Drummer will be performing twice - first on Friday May 20th at 12.30am at Brighthelm and later that day at 3.15pm at Horatios on the Brighton Pier. The duo will also be performing in London at the Hoxton Square Bar & Kitchen on Monday May 23rd.
Me And My Drummer recently released their new video for Easy On Me, taken from second album Love Is A Fridge, which out now via Sinnbus and available to buy on iTunes.
Love Is A Fridge musically covers a huge range of styles and ideas maintaining its bold feel and flavour for experimentation all the way through. If you imagine Bat For Lashes meets Lykki Li you’re close, but there’s something somewhat celestial about Me And My Drummer that sets them apart. The Duo have received acclaim from a range of sources, but most recently, their single Blue Splinter View was played on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6Music show. The duo have also received praise from the likes of XFM, BBC Radio 1, NME, Rolling Stone, MTV, DIY, The Line of Best Fit, Clash and The 405 and with a strong following in their home country, the band are making a bold step forward once again with their second album.
Me And My Drummer's label mates We Are The City will also be joining them at The Great Escape on Saturday May 21st at 4pm at Green Door Store and also at 12.30am (Sunday 22nd) at Brighthelm. The trio will also be performing in London at Birthdays on Sunday May 22nd.
You can check out the band's latest single Kiss Me, Honey - from the album Above Club - on the band’s YouTube channel now.
With a blend of Cayne McKenzie’s tropical keys and distant ethereal vocals with Andrew Huculiak’s tribal drums and David Menzel's minimalist and atmospheric guitar, the trio create a whirlwind of music that elevates the listener to new heights. There’s also a strong message of positivity in the lyrics as, faced with the trials and tribulations of life, no matter how tempting withdrawal from the world can be, it’s important to power through and find the strength to carry on.
Above Club is out now via Sinnbus and is available to buy on iTunes.
United Fruit release album stream of ‘Eternal Return’!
"a rich blend of alt-rock with pop structures..."
- Spin
"...the kind of pummelling instrumentation you’d find on main stages the world over." - DIY
“...A snorting, snarling, four piece rock explosion…” - Clash
United Fruit have previewed their forthcoming album, Eternal Return, on Spin ahead of its release on May 13th 2016.
United Fruit’s recent single Where The Sun Beats Down is also available to stream now via the band’s Soundcloud page.
United Fruit will also hit the road this month, including a date at Restless Natives Festival, full dates are below:
13/5 - Madhatters, Inverness
14/5 - Restless Natives Festival, St Lukes, Glasgow
15/5 - Sneaky Pete's, Edinburgh
21/5 - Tolbooth, Stirling
Eternal Return is a heart-pounding blast of energy, hope and passion. Featuring some of the band's most accomplished songs to date, as each track unfurls and bursts into a cacophony of riffs, high soaring vocals and hectic beats that will leave you exhilarated by the end.
The Glasgow based four-piece have taken their time with Eternal Return, slowly teasing fans over the last few years with single Open Your Eyes and their Nightmare Recovery EP, which features three tracks on Eternal Return - ‘Ghost Inside Your Head’, ‘Nightmare Recovery’ and ‘Cause And Effect’. Press were quick to pick up on the band’s thrilling punk rock sound with The 405 noting that, if played loud enough, ‘Nightmare Recovery’ would ‘probably wipe all that shit off your face’. Stereogum also featured ‘Ghost Inside Your Head’ after the band played a showcase for the critically acclaimed site at SXSW plus DIY, Drowned in Sound, Clash and The Skinny have been strong supporters of the band.
More so than ever before, Iskandar Stewart (vox, guitar), Stuart Galbraith (guitar, vox), Marco Panagopoulos (bass) and Dean Inglis (drums) have brought together their love of discordant, dissonant chords and melodies then destroyed the rule book and created their own unique sound upon its smouldering ashes. The result is Eternal Return - an eleven song beast that combines angular alt rock and pop, drenched in love, sweat and optimism.
From the uplifting riffs and driving beats, which channel the Smashing Pumpkins filtered through an early Rival Schools lens, on ‘Where The Sun Beats Down’ to Iskandar’s signature anthemic rock vocals on ‘Golden Days’, Eternal Return feels like an exciting journey for the band and one that only scratches the surface of what’s to come.
Eternal Return is out on May 13th 2016.