Un-Convention Factory at Roundhouse Rising

24 February 2011

Un-Convention Factory is back and bigger than ever, this time at The Roundhouse in London as part of Roundhouse Rising on Saturday 26th February.

Featuring 6 special music collaborations with musicians including Jon McClure (Reverend Soundsystem), Viv Albertine (The Slits), Charli XCX, Lupa (Colombian MC) plus many more, top producer Jagz Kooner along with 80 invited music industry experts and 200 participants all involved in creating, recording and producing an album in one day.

The 6 bands involved will cover, or collaborate, on tracks from London Calling by The Clash. Accompanying the recording will be a selection of panels, workshops and showcases. The highlight panels feature Music As A Tool For Social Change - featuring people working on music projects in Sri Lanka, Brazil, Colombia and the UK; The Politicisation of Music; Sustainable Careers in Music (featuring Debt’s own Louis Barabbas); New Music Strategies; an Event and Festival Session with Huw Stephens (Radio One).

A range of new digital platforms will also be showcased including SoundCloud and Song Kick. There will be one-to-one consultancies for bands, hands on workshops and live music performance throughout the day.

More info can be found here

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Monkey Poet's North America Tour

23 February 2011

Monkey Poet Matt Panesh is about to take his two award-winning shows “Welcome To Afghanistan” and “Welcome To The UK” to North America.

Described by The Stage as a “MUST SEE”, the two shows have garnered Panesh no less than seven awards around the world. There will be one last chance to see the two pieces in England (back to back) on Friday 25th February at White Circle (14-16 Lever St, Manchester) before he takes them across the Atlantic.

The USA and Canada tour is as follows:

3rd + 4th Canuck Cabaret, New Yorks Frigid Fringe, NYC

11th Welcome to Afghanistan Fringe Central, Mass Ave, Indianapolis

12th Welcome to the UK! Fringe Central, Mass Ave Indianapolis

18th UK + Afghanistan Toronto

25th UK + Afghanistan London, Ontario

For more information visit www.monkeypoet.co.uk

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Causes and Cures launch party

18 February 2011

Al Baker & The Dole Queue’s long awaited new album, “Causes and Cures”, is being released on Monday February 21st through Irregular Records.

To celebrate the release from this long time friend and associate of Debt Records, we are helping the band put on a very special (and FREE) show at Fuel Cafe Bar, our spiritual home in Withington, South Manchester.

Al Baker & The Dole Queue will be playing material off their new record, and will be joined on the bill by some of Debt Records’ finest folk players: Becca & The Broken Biscuits, Richard Barry & The Chaps and T. E. Yates.

There is a facebook event page with all the relevant information here

www.albaker.co.uk

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A Valentine's Day Poem by Alabaster Deplume

14 February 2011

A short verse
For true love
Mid-February

Chocolates Are for children:

Are we nearly there yet?

Have some chocolate.

Will you love me forever?

Have some bloody chocolate

You are prompted to be kind to your Significant Bother.

The roses are dead:

For you, my love,
The decapitated corpse
Of a once beautiful living thing

(A gift that says it better than words ever could)

Buy him
Or her
(With) a trinket,
And somehow
At astronomical seasonal prices
You will still manage to feel very,
Very cheap

What’s that in the sky?
Is it the Easter Bunny?
Is it Santa Claus?
No, it’s True Love!

It’s pink and red,
It tastes of strawberries
And it’s coming to a
VD clinic near you!

Happy Valentine’s Day
One and all!

International tax on idiocy

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Get Religion!

11 February 2011

“Get Religion!” the new studio record by Louis Barabbas & The Bedlam Six is now on general release as both a download (from places like iTunes etc) and as a carbon-neutral full-colour davinci presentation CD pack with eight page booklet and original artwork by A. Valliard.

The six-track mini-album features all the hallmarks that have made the band so popular on the UK alternative circuit: the vocal sparring of Alison Cegielka’s mellifluous soul tones and Louis’ broken-bagpipe growl, treading a tightrope over The Bedlam Six’s muscular rhythm section, grand piano, electric guitar and one-man trombone army. As well as the usual songs of love, lust and loathing, the record also resumes the story of Matilda the cat-killer (a projected ten-song narrative running through all the band’s releases, begun in their first album) with the eponymous heroine now blossomed into a jail-bound debutante.

Order your copy from the Debt Records Shop now!

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Stage at Liverpool's Threshold Festival

08 February 2011

This weekend Debt Records will be curating its own stage at Threshold, Europe’s largest indoor arts festival.

Threshold is Liverpool’s newest grassroots festival, an annual event boasting over 200 live acts from the worlds of music, dance, theatre, art and photography - and much MUCH more - under one roof.

Spontaneous, innovative and independent, on the second weekend in February Threshold will transform Liverpool’s CUC into a hive of arty, musical goodies; bands, dancers, exhibitions, flashmobs, photography, galleries and games, by a feast of performers and artists who’re the best of the North West. Watch, listen - learn. Get involved. Step over the Threshold…

Threshold is a partnership between promoters Under the Influence and the Liverpool CUC and this means it’s a festival with a conscience. Every penny you spend when you come to Threshold - every pie and pint, sandwich and snack you consume - goes straight back into helping those with greater needs and fewer chances. Profits from ticket sales are reinvested into next year’s festival.

Advance tickets cost £5 a day, or you can enjoy the whole weekend’s events for a tenner. For more information visit the festival website

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Full House for Bedlam Six live album!

06 February 2011

On Saturday 5th February Louis Barabbas & The Bedlam Six recorded a live album at the Dancehouse Theatre in Manchester. The evening featured two sets by the band and one by special guest John Otway (accompanied for two numbers by The Bedlam Six).

The night was a sell-out. By the closing number the audience was dancing in the aisles and in front of the stage. Then the bar was drunk dry and restocked no less than three times.

BBC photojournalist Gordon Jackson was granted an Access All Areas pass to cover the event. You can view some of his photos and commentary here

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