The Wytches, IC1s, a bit of this and a lot of that

Good day giggage readers!  Last few weeks have been super hectic with photog work, club nights and live music, and it looks set to continue at least until mid-December.  I am NOT complaining!  Here’s a quick roundup of what’s been going down in giggage-town lately, and what’s coming up soon.

One of the best new bands I’ve seen in a long time I saw twice in the last two weeks – The Wytches.  Get onto these guys if you haven’t already, noisy guitars, dark vocals and gloomy bass lines.  Bring on an album next year (crosses fingers).  Here’s my review on Shout4Music, and a few ‘unseen’ photos below.

The Wytches, 2013

I also caught IC1s recently, at both Heaven (supporting The Family Rain – love those guys) and The Macbeth in Hoxton.  They’ve been kicking around for a couple years but starting to get a buzz around them after supporting a few big name bands.  Another review on Shout4Music here, and more photos below!

Keep an eye on the blog in the next couple days/week for photos of The Courteeners (shot them at O2 Shepherd’s Bush last night – AMAZING – Liam Fray is a delight to photograph!), a band with some history, The Damned at The Roundhouse, and a band you should all check out, Damn Vandals at The Dublin Castle (lotta ‘damn!’-ing coming up).

After that, looks like a bit of a break in transmission for the Christmas/New Year period.  What are we all doing?  Anything exciting?  For me, the only place to be on NYE will have to be Nuis@nce, upstairs at The Enterprise in Chalk Farm.  Bound to be a fun evening of Britpop, indie and pop rock tunes.  What could be better?!

Cool Britannia 21st June 2013

It’s always exciting going along to Cool Britannia nights, because you’re never really sure what you’re going to get musically, or what kind of people will come along to see the bands.  June’s CB night saw four bands (a feat in itself) PLUS an acoustic set by Dean Mumford, he of Rifles fame.  Talk about packing it in!  The Deets were on first who were just fantastic, high energy, stage presence, dashing outfits, and most importantly – good tunes.  Sadly it seemed that most people were still out enjoying the ‘sunshine’ (ahem) at that time of the evening and The Deets played to a small crowd.  The people who were there seemed impressed though.  Violet Class up next which was a bit of a change of pace with their retro casual gear and 90s Britpop sound.  Super laid back, and a few more people milling around during and after their set.  Welcome Pariah on next, and while I’d seen them at a CB night previously I was happy to see them again, great band.  Catch them while they’re still playing the little venues!  Fiddlers Elbow was becoming slightly more crowded by now, with a fun bunch of people.  The crowd at these nights are always full of surprises!  The Mercanaries were last band proper on and they were hilarious.  Not hilarious in a bad way, oh no, just in a crowd interaction, entertaining way.  Jumping off the stage, jumping on each other, making a real fun time of the whole set.  Really hard to photograph as they were moving around so much – had to turn on the flash for most of the shots, which turned out well (new flash – YAY!).  Dean Mumford arrived on stage as the crowd had increased loads, and it was becoming rather sweaty in the venue.  He banged out a few old Rifles tunes and then started taking requests from the crowd on what to sing next.  A genuinely lovely fella.  The crowd were so involved that a few of them also jumped on stage, some assisting on drums, others on vocals.  Good stuff, and a brilliant end to a fun evening.

First time I’d given the new Canon Speedlite 430EX II flash unit a whirl and oh my, it’s lovely.  Just makes people in the crowd look that much… prettier!  Takes the harshness of the full frontal flash when it’s bouncing off the roof instead.  Never an issue with not being able to focus in a dark room either due to the red beam.  Took a few shots of Dean and The Mercanaries with the flash on as you can see below.  Still prefer the non-flash shots but some of the flash ones were amazing (the one with the two Mercanaries guys having a cuddle is ace!).  I had all three lenses there on the night – 35mm, 17 – 55mm and 75 – 300mm.  Changing them every five minutes was a hassle, so here’s to saving up for a lens that can do the job of all three of those lenses instead!!  Enjoy the pics, there are a lot of them…