Kate Winter Quartet - Jazz Blow - Oh Bar

I was wandering destitute through the streets of Camden, stumbling into the familiar surrounds of the Oh Bar only to find that tonight is jazz night.

There is a quartet on stage, I'm indulging my mishearing to think the compare chap called them the Edgar Wynters Quartet, but alas its really the Kate Winter Quartet. Its rather nice lounge jazz.

Girl singer, piano, standy up bassy thing, and drummer using brushes. Its a treacly smooth voice although there are bread crumbs in the treacle. Pretty sure these are all standards.

I was almost in tears when they played 'Have yourself a very merry christmas', sometimes life paints itself as though you are in a movie.

Some polite french chaps take seats at the table next to me. They look very much me and Milo did back in jazz fridays in Glasgow, polonecks and black jackets.

Ooh some neat walking bass solos, my gaulic tablemates lead the audience in applauding, cleary having read the same jazz bluffers guide as we had back in the day.

The singing girl's scat singing is okay, but my view of such things has been jaundiced by a skit on Fresh Prince with uncle Phil doing it.

There were moments where the noodles and the solos were a little ramshackle, I've had the same problem myself, but aye, these moments were brief.

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Yaaba Funk - Afro-Kokoa - The Big Chill

Afro-Boho, shoreditch jungle rhythms in a flatcap. Regular drums and bongos, at the same time! Almost ska-ish guitar, then the sax kicks in. I though it was all right but it turns out they were just sound checking.



Hours later they kick off on stage. Its the first time I've seen this kind of music played live. The three piece sax section really catched me, well that and the general rhythm that's got everyone moving.



Male / female vocals, a little too shouty for my tastes, but broadly euphoric.



It gets a bit political a few songs in, Obama and political freedom.

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Loney dear - Old Blue Last

Not sure who this last chap is, headline billing, sounds Swedish, looks like my cousin Jimbo.

He's got a backing band out in the crowd but for the first song they're not really up for joining him so he has to resort to magic.

He plays a chord and gets the audience to all sustain it, Ab. Its a weird sensation, I'm at gig, but the sound is coming from all around. Sure, it drifts in and out as folk give up and then are roused once more as the chap on stage strums and plays along, but it wraps round me disconcertingly.

The band join him onstage for the next song, tuning up whilst he regales us with a tale of their exploits earlier in the day.

Its very light music, drifting and acoustic, but I'm not into it. There's a couple stood right in front of me, really caught up in each other's eyes, almost oblivious to the music. Giggling and chatting, gazing at each other's faces. They distract me too much from the music, so I leave.

Martin Carr - Old Blue Last

This is the first time I've seen Martin Carr since November 1996 at Manchester Uni with Julia Roe. I missed out on the Bravecaptain thing during the past ten years, save some track on an NME cover CD.

Anyhoo he's on stage right now, hair contained in a bobble hat, acoustic guitar cappoed on second fret and Mary providing backing vocals. Its quiet, laid back stuff. Some fancy fingering, but the strings are buzzing like a bad 'un.

It sound like you'd imagine acoustic Boos b-side demos would sound like, his voice so familiar, and wee flourishes where you can imagine the trumpets would be.

The audience were a bit noisy, a few bursts of silence breaking out during quiet bits, but then the chatter rising again. I wonder what other shows he's got lined up and what new material recorded.

When I got bored of the final band of the night, I found myself crossing the street at the same time as Martin Carr and for a few brief moments I considered the person I would be if not for him and his music. No Boo Radleys, no gig at the Manchester Academy in '95, no first girlfriend, no emotional scarring, no learning to play those songs on guitar, no endlessly going to gigs to try to find the magic like that show at the Academy, no gig review blog. And none of this...

Adam Donen and The Drought - Old Blue Last

So I'm stood near the bar at the Old Blue Last, sweating a wee bit, a few feet in front of me is Andrew the photographer and just to my right is a bloke who looks like Ed Byrne.

On stage is a chap with big permed hair, scary starey eyes and for this song, an acoustic guitar. Adam Donen presumably.

They have a slightly dischordant sound but nice thundering bass and celtic-ish violin, although in this case it would be called fiddle.

Its a little bit too blarry for my tastes as though hs shouting at the audience, but I don't get it.

Nice baaa backing vocals, and organish keyboards.

They had a book of poems and a CD, and album for sale, I neglected to buy a copy.

The Beat Hotel: Shrag, The Loves, Smokers Die Younger, To Arms Etc - Buffalo Bar

I fell asleep as soon as I got home from work, and awoke a few hours later, hungry and still uncertain as to when the gig was.

Facebook had said it as tomorrow or was that yesterday? Dinner cooked too quickly, too many chillies, rush across town and I arrive at the Buffalo.

Folk I recognise from the internet stand around, members of Pocketbooks wave hello. The woman on the door keeps me standing for ten minutes whilst she natters to friends before taking my money and stamping my hand. My mood would have been two points better if she hadn't kept me standing outside in the cold.

Inside I've missed To Arms Etc. I keep missing them. At the Twee As Fuck Alldayer, during Esiotrot I was feeling sad and lonely, a guy from To Arms Etc. started chatting to me and raised my spirits. I promised I'd go an see his band, but still haven't quite made it. This weighs heavy on my mind. The tracks on their myspace are great.

The first band I actually see this evening are Smokers Die Younger, a five or six piece playing stark, stabby shouty music. At times sounding like Idlewild underlings Turn, but every so often with Art School Bricolage harmonies.


Smokers Die Younger

In the crowd I see members of The Give It Ups and to my right folk from Electrophonvintage.

What do they make of Smokers Die Younger? Who knows, they clap politely between songs.

A girl with pink hair steps in front of me to take photies of the band on stage, she leans back, occluding my view by about 90%, she's so close I am able to wipe my nose on her pigtails.

Amusement as the singing girl on stage takes apart the singer's mic stand mid-song, it falls to the floor and she has to scrabble around swapping mics.

I had a moment of introspection the other day, wondering what would have happened if I never got to London, if my flight from Glasgow was never instigated last year. Since records began the plan had always been to move to London, see The Loves. I did it 18 months ago and still get a warm fuzzy feeling in my tummy when I stand at the edge of the Buffalo Bar watching The Loves on stage. No matter what else is happening in my life, I know that just here, things are going to plan.


The Loves

The sound's not so good at the edge of the bar, too close to the guitar amps, not enough vocals, so I wonder about to find a sweet spot.

The line-up's changed over the years, 30 members according to the internet. Has it really een a decade since I was at the Roadhouse in Manchester with Nos telling me about them? They have a new rhythm guitarist, Jerome, leather jacket, easy chords, drummer from Pocketbooks, and I don't recognise the keyboard player.


The Loves

They play a lot of newish songs from their new album Three, out on Fortuna Pop in January, and even a song from the next album after that Jenna sings, a soul club number, which requires more subdued lighting and the smoking ban lifted.

Their set finishes with a seque into their evergreen classic Little Girl Blues, sounding as fresh as it did in the Peel session days.


Shrag

Not sure about the headline act Shrag, it could be my natural bias away from headline acts or its too late in the evening and I'm having internet withdrawl. Cutesy girl vocals, like in the Deirdres sometimes. Mostly droney throbbing guitars, but occasionally early Idlewild chopping. Very abrupt drums. Cute girls, I like the one on the right, but I don't seem to remember this mob at all from Indietracks.

Moustache Of Insanity, The Understudies and Help Stamp Out Loneliness - The Wilmington Arms

Its been a while since I went to a gig on my own. But here I am, somewhat late in the evening.

The location was poorly remembered, so after I'd parked my car there was some degree of wandrin' and soul-searching, trying to remember the name of the venue.
When I wandered in the last band were on stage. They sounded a bt like Lucky Soul, but the shiny singing girl has a distinctive voice, very deep, it sounds familiar. Have I see these people before?

I recognise the guitarist and bass chap, they were in Language of Flowers, I think they were on the same bill as me and the mighty Flyers when I played my London debut gig in '04.

Sometimes I feel like Sam Beckett in Quantum Leap, with that swiss cheese memory thing. I arrive at a gig, without Zippy or Al to tell me why I'm there, just a vague memory of having clicked on this show in Last.fm or Facebook, but still trying to figure out why.

I don't remember the name of the band on stage, or any ones I've missed.

I spot Trevor Lost Music and he waves, stood near is the chap from The Understudies, aw man, I've still never reviewed them. Its been three or four times I've seen them play, but never quite got round to typing up my notes.

I was stood lurking in shadows, jabbing at my mobile phone to look like I was doing something. I was skipping through old draft text messages, from when I thought I could text in gig reviews here. It was just notes, but I remember texting that The Understudies sound a bit like Kingmaker, and that I really ought to review them properly instead of going on about never having written about them.

I spot Will Harrison and Elizabeth Darling, from 'Allo Darlin', who I last saw on the platform at Indietracks. I don't see their bongo player.

Were they playing tonight and I missed them? No, they played Brixton the other day, and I remember missing that. Swiss cheese memory.

On the internet later:-

Moustache Of Insanity (Will Harrison's mob) - MP3s here
The Understudies
Help Stamp Out Loneliness (the band with folk from Language of Flowers)