The Fat Fox has recently been passed into new hands and they’ve been working away at turning it into a live music and events venue that Albert Road will be proud of. One of the many events they have lined up this month is the arrival of the joint Curly Hair and Foxes! UK tour on the 24th. This pair of Brighton bands that have drummed up admiration and support from the likes of the BBC, and local and national Press. Their Split Tour welcomes the new releases of both bands which have already started to garner attention.
On Toy Soldier records, and part of the Wilkommen Collective which includes The Sons of Noel and Adrian, Curly Hair have impressed BBC Radio 6’s Gideon Coe and Mark Riley, and gained attention from Steve LaMacq thanks to their stellar E.P. ‘Ivy League’. Made up of Benjamin, Jess, Martha and Michael, their unique brand of twee-folk-pop is guaranteed to have you spellbound. Their new double A single ‘8-Beat/Pumpkin Eye’ is due to release this month.
“I love it, I absolutely love it…an absolute delight!” – Marc Riley, BBC 6Music “(Ivy League is) a really lovely little ep!” – Steve Lamacq, Radio 2
Also hailing from Brighton shores, Foxes! are Adam, Kayla, Al and Matt, who create infectious indie-pop that has lead them to support the likes of Hot Toddies, Stornoway, Art Brut and Absent Elk. Their E.P. ‘Who Killed Rob’ brought them rave reviews across the country and…
“Their episodic jangly pop may represent the first attempt in musical history to wrangle winsome C86 indie with prog rock.” – Alexis Petridis, The Guardian, February 2010.
Local Support is provided by The Boy I Used To Be, who is quickly attracting attention thanks to his appearance at E4’s ‘Skins’ party, and soon to support Lightspeed Champion at The Wedgewood Rooms.
Black Cat Comedy Club in association with the World Famous Gong Show are hosting the KING GONG ~ the GRAND FINAL of the PORTSMOUTH GONG SHOW™ at The Fat Fox on Sunday 7th. Heats ran throughout the summer of 2009 with nine comedians battling it out for £100 cash prize and the chance of reaching the KING GONG GRAND FINAL™, with £250 Grand Prize as well as a prestigious gig at a future Black Cat Comedy Club.
The format is three series of three acts, hosted by compére RICHARD BROPHY. Each act gets a maximum of seven minutes to impress the audience. Three “red cards” will be amongst the audience, if, after a two-minute ‘grace period’, all red cards are held they are off. If they last the seven minutes they go through to the public vote. At least one act from each section must be allowed to go through for the public vote at the end…when the next Portsmouth Gong Show KING GONG winner will be announced.
Tickets are only £5 and available from the Fox direct. To find out about all of the comedians performing check the Facebook event for full details.
BRKNK returns for 2010 at the Fat Fox on Saturday 16th January featuring the following:
LOGISTICS
BROOKES BROTHERS
DJ TRU:BASS (updnb)
CHARGE
SDM vs. TRIPLE M
STAMINA MC & SKYDRO
Tickets are £5 before 9, £7 before 10 and £9 after, only available on the door. Get involved. For more information hit up the Facebook event and also have a listen to ‘Transporter’ by Logistics:
Black Cat Comedy presents Dave Thompson live at the Fat Fox on Sunday the 6th. Best known for playing Tinky Winky in the Teletubbies, Dave Thompson plays a semi-regular character in both series of Al Murray’s sitcom Time Gentlemen Please, and two cameo roles in Ben Elton’s feature film Maybe Baby. Dave has appeared in ITV’s The All New Harry Hill Show, and TV Burp! and plays various roles in Harry Hill’s stage shows, Wild Horses and Hooves.
As well as Dave Thompson, Pete Walsh will be performing stand-up and impersonations and as usual Richard Brophy will be compere. Tickets are £5 and full details can be checked out at the Facebook event.
The Hong Kong Gardeners Club are hosting Portsmouth’s own You’re Smiling Now but we’ll all Turn Into Demons‘ album launch as part of their Thursday residency at the Fat Fox. As well as the band playing the evening will also feature the following:
‘Oxford’s Elapse-O tap into a world before language. Elapse-O live is like a time-warp back to your childhood, back when you were attempting to make sense of all the sonic clutter around you, except that there is nothing immature about this band. It’s exhilarating – big bright lights exciting.’ – Drowned In Sound
Hong Kong Gardeners Club’s Thursday residency at The Fat Fox tomorrow features The Deads plus Chris Perrin & the Minor Falls and Mr Tom Dangerous playing a solo blues set.
“After a brief hiatus and flirting with other bands Clym and the boys have returned by popular demand, they are certainly one of the best live bands in Portsmouth and should not be missed!”
“Neil Young meets Sting at Ryan Adams’s house party! BIG melodies, intimate deliveries, insatiable musical hooks, and a glaze of honesty – captivating!”
“Chris Perrin has long been a man with obvious potential. From his early days fronting post-grunge rockers Thirst, to solo performances, before returning to the rock sound he had perfected with the excellent Zuma, he consistently showed an ability to rise above the standard indie-rock flock”
All for a modest £3 in advance from the bands or The Fat Fox. For more information see the Facebook event.
This Thursday (23rd) the Fat Fox hosts Dirty Little Rockstars, a showcase of local bands including The Edible Stems, The Rubicon (Formerly The Elements) and Kill Kasper plus DJ Spikey Mark too. Tickets are £5 in advance. For more information see the Facebook event.
We have some great news about our PRIMARY phonography exhibition (find out all the details here) that we can now announce:
- The deadline for submissions has now been extended to Sunday 4th March. We have had some incredible submissions but want to set aside more time to make the exhibition something really special.
- The competition is now open to up to 10 submissions from each individual. With the ability to capture many photos on your phone over the next two months we we want you to not feel restricted to just three. The same rules apply about the photos conforming to compositions using the primary colours though. If you have already submitted feel free to send more photos over as and when you please.
- The exhibition will be hosted by Albert Road’s own Bonzo Studio who are also partnering up with us in the creation of the exhibition space. More news on this soon!
- Finally, we will be running a competition as part of the exhibition where the best three photos submitted will win some incredible prizes. We will be announcing the prizes available very soon but got to say, these will be the best prize haul we have ever offered.
- We will be putting together a poster for the exhibition that will be on sale on the opening night. The poster will feature some of the best submissions and all profits from the sales will go to a local charity (details to follow soon). Due to this we need to say that any photos submitted to PRIMARY will involve you giving us permission to use them for commercial purposes, if you do not want your photo used in this way simply let us know via email.
Well, that is it for now! We really hope to drum up as much coverage locally for PRIMARY in the next couple of months so if you could Facebook/Tweet/+1 about the exhibition we would really appreciate it. We would love this exhibition to be a real reflection of the whole population of Portsmouth with everyone taking part and feeling involved.
Righto chaps, it’s time to clean shave your boat race and get that mighty moustache on the grow in support of Movember for The Prostate Cancer Charity and the Institute of Cancer Research. For 30 days of November you can help support and raise awareness through selflessly parading your top lip for charity.
You can sign up yourself, as I’m sure many of you already have, or you can join the Strong Island team and seek out sponsorship as a team. Through the Strong Island Movember page you can ask people to join the group, make donations, upload photos and post updates via the MoSpace page, Facebook and Twitter.
Head over to www.mobro.co/StrongIsland if you would like to get involved and grow a Strong Moustache to help raise awareness, or simply head over to www.uk.movember.com and sign up to personally raise money.
The funds raised in the UK support the number one and two male specific cancers – prostate and testicular cancer. The funds raised are directed to programmes run directly by Movember and our men’s health partners, The Prostate Cancer Charity and the Institute of Cancer Research. Together, these channels work together to ensure that Movember funds are supporting a broad range of innovative, world-class programmes in line with our strategic goals in the areas of awareness and education, survivorship and research.
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