2012 Fringe Festivals with Eccentronic:

Brighton Fringe in May (11-13, 17-19, 25-27)
Edinburgh Fringe in August (2-12)

I had so much fun (well, we didn’t throttle each other) doing ‘Waiting for Bono‘ last year with John Callaghan, we decided to form a band!  Now trading under the name Eccentronic, we will be taking our rather daft eccentric, electrical cabaret show for 2012, “We Won’t Rock You” to the two biggest Fringe festival in Europe. No pressure then…  Updates shortly on the Eccentronic Website

Bruit de Fond - March 29th, Coventry

A night of experimental audio visual chaos – in Coventry!  This looks to be a v. fun shindig and I’ll be doing a somewhat esoteric set of instrumentals and songs.  Tickets on door (just turn up)

Lanchester Gallery, The Hub, Jordan Well, Coventry. CV1 5QT

Thursday 29th March, 8pm till 10pm
For those of you that can’t be arsed to make it – live Stream of the event: www.ustream.tv/channel/bruit-de-fond

Artists:

OHMMM (Orchestra of Home Made Musical Machines) are an Art Noise ensemble consisting of 4 artists/ designers: Steve Snell, Andrew Spackman, Craig Barber, Steve Chamberlain. Each individually build sound machines, which when performed, must remain contained within an equipment box of fixed dimensions and adhere to a set of rules and guiding principles. The ensemble perform together to create improvised experimental music, which often juxtaposes with a visual or performance component.

http://ohmmm-ohmmm.blogspot.com

Hypnotique electro-cabaret live shows explore the fundamentals of a good yarn: trapped within her wicked web of intrigue is a mêlée of macabre tales definitely unsuitable for children, surreal lunar musical landscapes, stories from an ultra modern world, hypnotic ether sounds and darn funky grooves which transport the voyeur from near drug induced euphoria to the obsessive despairs of high Romanticism.

SCHH - The individual members of SCHH had previously performed together in various combinations but first came together as a group in 2007 for a concert at Mike Hurley’s Fizzle series in Birmingham.  The members of the group represent different generations of improvisers and come from different musical backgrounds, from free Jazz to experimentalism, but all share a love improvisation.

Bruce Lee Gallanter of the Downtown Music Gallery, New York described Murmurations as featuring “some of the best British improvisations I’ve heard recently.”

http://www.myspace.com/brucecoates/music

On 19th Feb I will be playing a short concert at King’s Place with theremin virtuoso (and my original theremin teacher) Lydia Kavina and a 6-person theremin ensemble.  The event is ‘Experimenting with Grainger‘ and is part of the Percy Grainger festival taking place at King’s Place, London.

We’re playing three REALLY short pieces called ‘Free Music’ which are all graphic scores written in (I think) the 1930s which basically looks like a lot of wiggly lines.  Our challenge is to convert this into pitch and melody – perfect for the theremin but intricately difficult in practice.   They’ll be a video showing what we’re (supposed to be) playing, and a short film about Percy Grainger’s ‘Eye Tone Tool’ invention.

Tickets are £9.50 and going very quickly.

If that really isn’t enough thereminists playing in tandem for you, the very same day in Croydon, the London Theremin Orchestra are playing the Electronic Arts Review festival in Croydon.  Contrary to some reports, neither myself nor Lydia will be there as we’ll be at Kings Place.

So there really is no excuse to not enjoy the harmonious, and disharmonious, sounds of a dozen or more theremins then.

Woo, woo – and indeed – woo.

Trish Keenan with electronic music legend Jean Jacques Perrey, backstage at AV Festival, Gateshead, 2008. Copyright S O'Neill

It was with sadness I read through the Twitter-vine that Trish Keenan from the seminal electronic band Broadcast passed away yesterday.  For a musician who is taken before her time (she was just 42) the outpouring of tributes reveals how much the band’s music meant to those whose hearts it touched.

I met Trish several times through my own music work and mutual friends, but first and foremost I was a fan.

I first came into contact with Broadcast in the late ’90s when I was studying in Birmingham.  I became intrigued and later involved in the emerging ‘lofi electronic’ scene through the ‘We Brought Our Friends‘ band night and publication. Like-minded bands like Plone, Pram and Avrocar were blending analogue synthesizers, 1950-70s lounge and library music with more contemporary aesthetics. It was cool, but it was pretty much our secret.   In 1999 I produced my dissertation paper which cited the revival of early electronic music in Birmingham, ‘Space Age Music and the Moog‘.

But the emerging, most reputed (and arguably the best) of all these bands was Broadcast.  They were starting to cut an international path, signed to Warp Records and touring Europe – soon appearing on mainstream media shows like ‘Later With Jools Hollands‘ (it was slightly cooler back then).   I saw them play small gigs on home turf at the Jug of Ale pub in Moseley, South Birmingham; later seeing them blossom and their fanbase grow to perform big multimedia visual shows at venues like The Scala in London.

For me as a post-teen’indie kid’ living in South Birmingham at a time when the city was still emerging from it’s grimy manufacturing cocoon, it was the angst of early Broadcast material that first drew me to them, augmenting my interest in early electronic music.   ‘Work and Non-Work’, their collection of early EPs brought together on an LP vinyl release with its distinctive orange sleeve in homage to library music, became the soundtrack to the more introverted, isolated times of my college days.  Spending long Sunday mornings trying to write an essay by hand or compose music, pondering the experiences from some gig that week.  Today, it is still my favourite of all their records and one of my favourite albums from this period in my life.

Broadcast’s melancholic songs about boredom, frustration at attending parties and traversing back to Chelmsey Wood were rich mead to a disenfranchised, precocious girl in Birmingham.  The time I spent living in the heart of the music scene’s neighbourhood, Moseley, was a seminal time for me as a musician, quietly studying the development of the bands.  The spirit of these times was entirely ‘DIY’ – anyone could create music or start a band, with plenty of boys – and importantly lots of girls – doing it.  For a brief moment it looked like I would stay in Birmingham and join one of these bands, but fate twisted another way and instead I came to London and got involved in very different types of music there.

As someone so entrenched in British indie music then, I saw the links between Broadcast and classic indie bands.  Come On Let’s Go” (from the ‘Noise Made By People’, their first full length album and the best) is one of my favourites:

“What’s the point of spending time / with people that you’ll never know? / Come on let’s go”

For me this was a softer echo of The Smiths:

‘In my life/ Why do I waste valuable time/ with people who don’t care if I live or die?’ (“Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now”)

My favourite track from this period was ‘The Book Lovers‘.  The sweeping melody, the mystic but earthed lyrics and the haunting harpsichord are sounds I’ve absorbed into early Hypnotique solo work.

In recent years I met Trish and her musical and life partner Jam through gigs and mutual friend Wolfram Wire (who I met through a fansite as a fellow Broadcast fan, he later went on to collaborate on music projects with them and I with him).   She was always beautiful, warm and appreciative of those who cared about music – not at all like the detached figure seen in their videos and interviews which I think showed her naievity and discomfort at being part of the business of music.

I remember listening to Joe Meek for the first time at her house in Kings Heath and how enthused she was about exploring music and discussing it – despite relative ‘fame’, she had lost none of her passion for authentic and unusual music.

Broadcast’s path was a lonely furrow: spending many years creating a perfect album does not a good bank balance make.  Broadcast were a ‘sonic’ bands people wanted to admire and emulate but not necessarily buy their music ( like fellow Duophonic label mates Stereolab), but seeing, despite their comparative ‘fame’ how they lived within such basic means, without access to good studio space (they were recording drums in the local church) or producers, made me sad and increased by scepticism of the means to survive in the business of music.  Yet this did not detract from their pursuit of their life project, Broadcast, bringing with them many voyagers with them on their path.

I became less commited to their later work – it seemed more abstracted, focused on the software’s technology rather than the beautiful melodies that drew me to them originally – before drawing back to a very fragmented version of their early 1950s sci-fi and library influence with the recent Focus Group collaboration.  But throughout their shifting styles I was always drawn to her voice – haunting tones reminiscent of Nico - a pure voice from a more innocent era many decades before.

In smaller live shows Trish and Jam performed as a duo, the sound  became freer, perhaps away from the scrutiny of the music media and pressure to be a ‘proper band’, Trish appeared more beautiful and confident.  They were, like all of us, music lovers trying to find the optimum means of self-expression – a lifetime’s work with its peaks and troughs.

Trish Keenan with electronic music legend Jean Jacques Perrey, backstage at AV Festival, Gateshead, 2008. Copyright S O'Neill

This picture was the last time I saw Trish in Gateshead, 2008.  Her and Jam were DJing to support my good friends Jean Jacques Perrey and Dana Countryman.  She had asked if she could meet Jean-Jacques as she was a fan, so of course I made the introduction.  It was nice for me to bring together two people I had such respect for individually, and I like this photo (Trish said it made her look like a curious little child) which shows two magical people immersed in a discussion about their passion for music.

It’s a cliche, but it goes without saying that she was taken from us too soon, but the legacy of her music, her purest voice, shines.

Farewell, my lovely.
Come on, let’s go.

Duelling theremins! I will be performing with Youtube sensation and Theremin pioneer Theremin Hero who brings his unique talent to the festival with an evening concert at Antenna, the endnote in a musical day at GameCity5, the computer games festival in Nottingham. Bringing videogames soundtracks to life with the aid of a Theremin. We will be playing a couple of computer games tunes.

Check out his Theremin Guitar Hero video (i’m crap at Guitar Hero so I’m hoping I will be better with aid of La Theremine)

This time, the good folks of Colchester and Ipswich will be benefiting from some saguine entertainment in not one but two splendid shows on Saturday July 3rd:

First up I’ll be doing an acoustic set at approx 5pm in this old ruined church. Naturally an acoustic set is a bit of a challenge for an electronic mistress such as myself, but I have a few ideas up my sleeve which involve doing very stripped down and only slightly electronically enhanced rare Hypnotique tracks. Tea will be drunk solemnly in the pews.

Join this event, organised by Lee Ashcroft from Mixamatosis, on Facebook

Then tonight we fly to Ipswich, where I’m playing third fiddle to the colossal John Callaghan at approx 8pm. This will be more a straight-eight electronic Hypnotique set, with a mooted ‘exciting’ duet with Mr Callaghan TBC. It’s also the single launch for a lathe cut acetate single by John with hand knitted sleeves, which sounds incredibly exciting.

Myself and Mr Callaghan were recently waiting for quite a while for Bono from U2 to turn up to our pub gig in Nottingham. I’m happy to report he did turn up and treated us to his mash up of ‘Where The Streets Have No Name / When I’m Cleaning Windows’ – a world exclusive and far better than Glastonbury! Sadly the guys who did the video had a sherbert too many so the footage is a bit too wonky to use (given our usual high production values) so this performance will have to remain in the hearts and minds of the select few but we’re hoping to repeat it again in the future.

All Hail The Gods of Rock n Roll

Last week I sneaked into the Rocktastic Download festival in the home of rock, Castle Donnington (next to East Midlands airport). Despite my reservations about the misogony of ‘rawk’ music, I had a suprisingly toe-tapping hip-hip-hooraying time, getting down with the bandana wearing accountants and their teenage kids. Highlights were the £4Million fee-paying we-bring-our-own-stage ACDC. Also enjoyed: Slash from Guns n Roses with guests doing Axl’s bit including Steve Tyler from Aerosmith and Lemmy from Motorhead, Steel Panthers (sort of cross between Spinal Tap and Kunt & The Gang) and Aerosmith.

But Miss Hypnotique, are you losing your gothic/fey/electro/indie cool by worshipping cock-rock gods? Not at all: what I admired was these guys (practically all guys too) tenancity, professionalism and commitment to living the rock dream – even (in the case of Saxon) when age and credibility were long gone (thankfully, the big hair lived on. It must be something in the water, only rock drummers are allowed to go bald). The big acts placed entertainment at their heart: as frothy and silly as much metal is, great melodies and great performance is at the heart of their values, producing many timeless classics of their era. I can imagine Slash, Steve Tyler, Lemmy et al all hanging and having pool parties (Barrymore style) in LA together. And they are true to their style, their vision and their fans. Or as my mentor Jean-Jacques Perrey says to me: “Have your style and keep your style all your life.”

Despite the different between they and I in geography and style, I believe myself and Mr Tyler are cut from the same cloth: we are determined to entertain at all costs to life, limb and fashion. Whereas Mr T may prefer the company of supermodels and sing about making Love in An Elevator (Or Bonk in a Lift, as the Brits version
tells it) as oppose to songs about ritual voodoo witchcraft in Hackney, I feel we’re on the same page: that’s entertainment. Let me entertain you. Music is my first love, and it will be my last. All hail the rock gods: god gave rock and roll to YOU.

Miss H
x

The last month has been something of a musical whirl and I’m only just catching my breath before (gasp) another set of shows, most particularly a performance art show this coming Tuesday in Nottingham with my good friend John Callaghan. It’s not really a musical event this time but more of a conceptual art event (or general silliness, depending on how it transpires) as we mark time waiting for the arrival of Bono (from U2). A combination of electronic humour, pathos, and the potential for all kinds of unexpected shennanigans. Please throw us your ideas for general debauchery and who knows? Maybe Edinburgh will call next year.

April 17 was the rather amazing Hands Off event at Sound Bank Centre in London where 20 of us thereminists gathered for a concert of classical and experimental theremin music, including an amazing 20 piece theremin orchestra improvisation incanting the spirit of the great Icelandic volcano. My Etherwave Pro theremin, usually resplendent in its uniqueness felt like the girl with the matching dress in company with about 10 other etherwaves on the day. Lucky folks got to try there hands at the theremin too in the amazing setting of the Clore Ballroom amongst mechanical and electronic sound installations. An amazing events – check out some of my live videos from the day (HD video to follow soon).

April 24 was ‘Theremin Day‘ in Birmingham – an afternoon of making optical theremins followed by an event performance organised by Sam Underwood (who I’ve recently collaborated with on a surf track for his Glatze project) who did a version of Steve Reich’s pendulum music for theremin, and my very old friend Pete Ashton played his Thingamygoop. Due to the outstanding contribution of bloggers and reporters in the room, the event has been extraordinarily well archived:

- Phantom Circuit (my former compadre from Rhythmicon) did a great radio show with interviews and recordings you can stream with an extensive interview with me.
- Nicky Getgood captured video of my set: Talking about theremin’s history and playing Vocalise
- Hello Catfood snapped photos and blogged the day, as did
- Nicky Pugh, who shot some video of me playing a graphic score and the Dr Who theme
Thanks to Sam, the Fzzpop hack space gang and all the bloggers for creating, making and sharing in such a fantastic event!

May 14th was the Poliphiloprogenitive event in Bedford, curator Gerry Paci’s radical move to bring extreme art culture to the English provinces. Performance artist Luci Fiction emerged from a bed of soil to welcome the underage nighclub attendees of Bedford, and I started my set with two catchy numbers about Dictators and Genocide. Artists Philip Diggle (the brother of he of The Buzzcocks, and the guy who gave The Stones Roses et al the ideas about live art painting) performed a live art painting spilling on to Lurke Street, which I captured in my live interview with him. It was a bold evening of scrumptious Berlin performance art, sculpture, decor and film which we’re hoping to take back over to Berlin. I had a fantastic time and thanks to all the kind folks I spoke to who were either a) from Bedford and amazed or b) had come from London and were totally in the zone. We need to do more events like these.

So coming up for me:

- We’re a good way into Babyslave’s third album, and we’re about to unveil our rather amazing new website too and news on releasing the back catalogue too.

- July I’ll be doing a show in Colchester, details TBA

- September shows in Germany TBA

- Over summer I’ll also be unpacking more video, audio and album material from Hypnotique, which is pleasantly brewing…

An update for the season of spring and the cruci-fiction of Christ to let you know of some exciting activities in the chateau de Hypnotique:

New Shows:

After a rip-roaring show at Nottingam Contemporary gallery last month entertaining the masses in a tribute to communist USSR electronic traditions, I’m on a roll with other theremin-themed events this spring:

17th April – Hands Off!
Clore Ball Room, South Bank Centre
1-5pm
An afternoon recital featuring great theremin works, cello theremin and a chance for all the family to try their hand at the theremin as part of the Ether Festival. I’ll be joining an epic circle of 20 thereminists as we attempt to conjure up demonic presence from the ether. May the force be with us.

Event on Facebook

Event details on South Bank website

24th April – Fizz Pop Theremin Day

79-81 Cheapside, Birmingham, B12 0QH

An event at Birmingham Fizz Pop Hackers space. In the afternoon learn how to make an optical theremin with Mister Underwood
(2-6pm) and I’ll be on hand to chat and for people to try out their
theremins. Tickets are £20 and include all the kit to make the
theremin.

The evening (from 8pm) is a concert featuring myself performing a
range of different theremin music with Mister Underwood performing
Steve Reich’s Pendulum Music for optical theremin and torch, and one of my very old chum’s Pete Ashton’s Thingamigoop machine.
Tickets £6

More info:


http://www.mrunderwood.co.uk/gigs/theremin-day/

Buy your ticket for evening show here

Event on Facebook

14th May – electronic culture event

The Pad, Bedford
2 Lurke Street, MK40 3HY

London folks – get this in your packed social diary: an evening of electronic culture and art in Bedford featuring an
electronic experimental set by Hypnotique and:
Josephine Seeger – Lady-Balloon videos

Philip Diggle

More artists and details TBC, check www.myspace.com/misshypnotique nearer the date.

Other things I’m up to:

- Planning a tour commencing in Cologne, Germany in early Sept with Mr John Callaghan to promote an exciting kraut-themed remix project – if you’d like to book us together for your venue in France, Germany or Switzerland then drop me a line (info@hypnotique.net). John and I are working on new hit disco collaborations for the forthcoming Hypnotique long player – we’ve also completed a video for our dancefloor ‘hit’ “You Lack Discipline” directed by John himself.

- Recording the third LP with my industrial-trio Babyslave (due for release winter 2010) and launching our new website soon, with some news on the re-release of our deleted back catalogue some of you folks have been asking about…

- Working on a new song for a release on wax cylinder release. Extremely limited edition, for winter 2010.

And finally – my peformance indoctrinating the London night-time crowds to the joys of both early electronic music and cake on the Fourth Plinth at Trafalgar Square as part of Anthony Gormley’s ‘One and Other’ project is still available but is moving in May to this location at the UK Web Archive

Onwards through this cruel winter to the rites of spring!

Ms Hypnotique
x

On October 2nd I took part in a rather unique and strange performance – high above Trafalgar Square, London.

It was part of Anthony Gormley’s One and Other project, which placed 2,400 people over 100 days on a plinth, 8 metres high, on Trafalgar Square as a sort of social experiment to see what the people of Britain may do. Generally a lot of costumes, tomfoolery and nudity entailed – but watching some of the Great British public – either in person or via the web stream – did at times make Big Brother look entertaining.

Delighted was I to be selected by the random ballot (well randomish, apparently they selected people to be representative by age/ethnicity of the British population). Naturally, I seized on the opportunity to bring a bit of theremin and electronic influence to the plinth, and for one who has been accused of being a fifth columnist this was naturally an opportunity to subvert (in an entertaining fashion).

By another random (or maybe not so) coincidence, my Belgian lodger had been a plinther on week 2 and gave me a good briefing. “No electricity” he informed, “and no fires.”. Arse. Electricity is something of a pre-requisite for thereminising. Most of my energy focused in seeking a solution to the electricity – alongside praying for no rain on the plinth and working on a back-up plan (which mainly involved eating biscuits and listening to a cassette tape of Rick Astley).

The basic plan was:

Elegant and mysterious costumery
- A selection to gently introduce general public to:
a) the theremin
b) a few Hypnotique tunes
- Rounded off with tea and cake – quintessentially English.

Two days before the plinth date – calamity struck. My portable electronic station (an evil yellow non-branded object from merchants of doom Argos) succeeding in not powering my gear but instead colluding to explode my lovely T-Vox Tour theremin (build by George Pavlov, imported from Russia and no longer for sale, to say it was priceless is an understatement) and FX unit.

Luckily Papa Hypnotique – a trained electronic engineer – saved the day at the 11th hour by raiding a television to replace the blown transformer, and a lower tech but effective solution involving a car battery/inverter looked to do the trick.

On the day I was naturally nervous – mainly about everything actually working up there (less so about warping the minds of the population of London’sTrafalgar Square on a Friday evening, en route to the pictures, theatre or whatever things people in London do).

Messer John Callaghan accompanied me (I collected him in a drive-by pick-up round the back of Nelson’s Column in a scene reminisent of The Italian Job – only involving a Peugeot 106) – and the artful dodger also scored his own slot on the plinth a few days later (which he used to make a pop video…an awesome idea). Here’s John’s hour of glory on the plinth.

There was an endless amount of pissing about beforehand what with security, audio interviews (my life story is now somewhere in a Wellcome Trust archive), an interview for Sky Arts Channel (the presenter was struggling linking from me to a chain-smoking 18-year old whose plinth piece was about self-harm). So there wasn’t an opportunity to test anything and the lengthy set-up before I start playing was annoying but inevitable.

But ta-da- no rain, no wind, no terrorist bombings and the theremin sung sweetly into life.

Some thoughts from the plinth:

I couldn’t see much as I was so concentrated intend on playing (and wearing a mask) – but the full moon shone beautifully behind me – an eery an lovely place to thereminise. Not without temperament from the breeze, which added gusto.

It inspired me to want to do more theremin shows in unusual places – mountains, caves, hills – anything is possible. So I billed the show as the start of my ‘extreme theremin’ tour.

The crowds below seemed to enjoy it – or at least be weirded out, which is nothing but a good thing. Lots of pissed up folks, passers-by and some good friends of mine too. Apparently two drunks sang along to ‘My Way’. I hope I created a bit of unexpected magic in their evening.

The hour passed all to soon – I didn’t get a chance to play half of the music I had. But I sneaked in a couple of Hypnotique numbers, a few Babyslave tunes and a mix of classical, pop and easy listening numbers suitable of a eine kleine nachtmusik. Soon the pick-up truck came to lift me from the plinth, I quickly gulped down a cup of tea and cake and I was whisked away.

Of course there was the inevitable backlash from the theremin community (“I would have been so much better” etc) – reminding me of madame Lydia Kavina’s comment about one particularly cliqueish theremin community – “it’s like gossiping in the kitchen.”

But dash it, I don’t care, because for one hour only I was Queen of Trafalgar Square, a mock-hero in the company of Britain’s good and great – creating a little theatre, a little silliness, and a lot of thereminising.

I have just two regrets:
1) I actually had two outfits on underneath my green ball gown. But I got a bit chicken about stripping off into the skimpier stuff. And it was cold.
2) I wish I’d followed Callaghan’s lead – I was mic-d up but I just concentrated on the audience in Trafalgar Square, whereas there was a story to be told to the folks watching on the web.

Well check out the full video of my plinth show (it kicks off proper about 15 mins in). The sound is a bit arse because it’s not set up for people making a lot of noise but gets better balanced halfway through.

Let me know what you think!

x

Well I have a copy in hand – and if readers turn to page 32 will find a short interview with yours truly. When editor Suraya Sidhu Singh approach me for an interview vignette I assumed it would be the usual fanzine thang, and I’m delighted for her the mag has taken off in such far-reaching ways. I’d urge you to bag a copy from their website now as this is likely to be somewhat collectable.

As for the erotica. Well Filament is actually a collection of interesting articles on a range of issues relevant to women who think independently, for whom sadly there is very little in the magazine market for us, so Filament nicely fills a gap in the newsagent racks. It isn’t a porn mag – apart from some nicely lit photos of topless guys (that may appeal to some but misses the mark for me, a bit too effeminate) and an interesting article debating the ethics of pornography. The media blow-up to me just really shows how far in the mainstream media the idea of women thinking and writing for themselves – without the input of a cosmetics marketer – has to come in the publishing industries. The internet is a whole other matter – which is why fandom online is definitely a better space for criticism and debate than the commercial press.

Grab it while its hot.

Last night saw the launch of Cococo Apocalypso, a night billed as Nottingham’s first Weimar-inspired dada cabaret night. I decided to start up this night – mixing up surreal comedy, theatre and electronic music with a fine dose of neo-punk attitude – because basically they say if you’re not part of a scene then start your own. It’s a conduit to bringing the interesting artists I know, and a few acts I’m associated with, to my home town as a neat little Midlands tour stop-off, when previously they would have bypassed Nottingham for more experimental-friendly bigger cities north and south. And because fuck all interesting seems to happen musically here. And because life is very long and dull and you have to amuse yourself somehow.

The night was a beard-themed cabaret night celebrating Kunt and the Gang‘s wonderful “Men WIth Beards (What are they hiding?)” EP launch. Read the full sordid press release (which sadly didn’t make it it into the Evening Post, nor the Left Lion an, allegedly, local culture mag) for the whole shebang.

The Chameleon Cafe, an interesting art-friendly bolt hole off the town’s Market Square run by eccentric Blues obsessed landlord Nick, who wants to get more theatrical and ‘weird shit’ stuff going down in the cafe. There was a rather ‘eclectic’ exhibition in the venue which ranged from scenic watercolours, photos of dolphins to some fab large portraits of strippers and men in S&M gear – a perfect backdrop to the creative smorgasbord which was brought forth.

A few keen chaps and chapettes did go with the beard theme, and some had even brought very elegantly handmade strap-ons with some stick-on moustaches for other members of the audience to play around with to experience life as a man with a beard (an experiment Kunt has been living and blogging for over 7 weeks, despite only rustling up a 17-year-old’s bum fluff effect).

I kicked off proceeding with a “fuck off” noisy set as Ms Hypnotique, before EssexPubOrgy geezer Alix Sinclair, performing as the ‘large poet’, did some very witty poetry including caravaning in Derbyshire, looking suprisingly like Tiny Tim. Later on he was joined by a guitarist to do some songs with a lot of fun props including beards, parrots and an effigy of Jesus with subjects including Rolf Harris, drug-induced witches of Harem and pirates. This was a lot of fun and suprisingly melodic.

James Hately performed “stubble busting”, contemplating how shaving animals may reveal another animal underneath, and the same with celebrities – like shaving Russell Brand reveals Amy Winehouse. I wondered if shaving Kunt (and the Gang) might reveal Sinitta underneath – or perhaps Gary Glitter.

Sleaford Mods, aka Jason Williamson, was a definite highlight of the proceedings. He delivered a venom-filth fuelled rant insulting everyone and anything that crossed his path – including abusing the audience: “What are you cunts clapping for?” – which strangely just made you love him more. I love J’s music – sure it’s bleak, acutely offensive and sometimes just too close to home (like ‘Teacher Faces Porn Charge’ about buying discount beer and pizzas from the cornershop) but it really strikes you in the heart and makes you feel uplifted, cathartic and cleansed afterwards – like a mudbath of the mind. And you can’t beat a bit of ultra-violence I say…

Kunt and the Gang, coming on to Gary Glitter’s “Do You Wanna Be In My Gang?”, entertained us for a non-stop 40 min hit parade of his unique blend of songs about wanking and crying (including over a polaroid of an ex-girlfriend who died), Carol Voderman and even asked the question “Chips or Tits?” (how’s a man to decide!).

Beards off to Kunt, the poor dear was horribly poorly after picking up a virus from a baby that shit itself near him, yet the trooper got through the full set complete with star jumps – and with the help of Little Kunt, his conjunctial twin brother – for the wonderful alternative love duet “Fred and Rose“. I’ve seen Kunt loadsa times, so I’d be interested on the impressions of those who haven’t seen him before – but curiousity let to some belly laughs and he soon charmed the throngs, winning him a few new devotees.

Coincidentally, I found out that we chose our timings well: Nov 11 is the date of Martinmas. According to Nottingham performance artisans Reactor this is when:

“In the 4th century AD, the Bishop St. Martin was walking to Rome on a pilgrimage. He encountered Satan and was mocked by him. As punishment St. Martin turned the devil into a donkey and rode the lazy beast for the remainder of his journey. The Donkey cursed him and spoke in palindromes.“

A timely parallel with the devilish shape-shifting and tongues of palindromes of the night ( Reactor are looking for Secret Members to join their 12 month Martinmas clan btw. )

Overall I think a fun night and worthwhile endeavour and thanks to those who came for making this a memorable first experiment. If you came, let us know what you think and what you’d like to see if you came again or suggestions of acts to perform. If you took any photos or videos stick em up on Flickr, your blog, YouTube wherever and post the link in the comments.