Pixyskin

Today we're going to start off with you lovely people. You are why we do this.There is no point being an artist if you don't have an audience.OK we can get into some existential arguments over this point. But the fact remains without an audience, and that's you, we would have no reason to be. So applaud yourselves.Here's Moony and Benny T doing some Opaque stuff.

Oh Gee whizz and cor blimey it's my "daughter" Abi, with Richard making "Istari", now imcreased to a three piece with the addition of Tereena on tin whistle.
Rapidly becoming a Unity favourite and best friend, Tallulah Rendall.

Our main act of the night. The very wonderful "Big Hand" a Ska band from Scotland. They had you rocking. But the bizarre thing is you were rocking so much we were scared the roof/floor was going to collapse. Now some of you may have thought Tereena was over reacting when she told you all to calm down. But I went downstairs with Moony and saw the ceiling bowing visibly. You were all having a great time. But we had to resort to safety first mode. It was a precaution
Pixyskin is a victim of it's own success. We've never had so many people having such a great time as this night.

Rock on mes enfants.

Grass Roots Festival- The final cut

We're on the final leg of this marathon journey that is the Grass Roots Picturethon. Here's Buckle St.Meanwhile over in the Acoustic tent those weird and wonderful eccentrics Karmadillo.
Tammy Garcia made legions of fans when she played Bar Lisboa, so we were all thrilled when she agreed to play the festival.
Here's a montage of various acoustic acts that appeared. There's Moony of course and Sam Beer on the right, no doubt the Evil One will let me know the centre two guys are.
More crowd pictures, don't you guys just love it.
Point of Origin.
Final act of the weekend on the main stage. Groove Cartel.


We're nearly there only another 250 photos to work through. Stay tuned.

Unity 6th July 2006

Unity was really rocking tonight. My car is in dry dock, I had to walk, so I could have a beer or five. We had the pleasure of the company of Miss Peterborough 2006 Ayeesha (forgive my spelling if I've got it wrong). She sanga a song for us accapello which went down a storm, more of that later. Kizzy is leaving us tomorrow to go to Wales. How she managed to stay in her top I don't know. She will be missed. Also it was Moony's birthday. Photos of his Birthday gig to follow.
And here is the beautiful Melissa, who promised to take me to bed if I gave her an individual photo and didn't relegate her to a montage shot, or ignore her completely. What can I say? I'm a gentleman. I do what I'm told. If that's what she wants that's what she gets. She may play the sweet innocent but underneath she's .....
Oh dear! Jodie. Here's a tip for you guys. Learn foot massage. My sister did a course on massage and taught me each week what she'd learnt. I've got to tell you guys, master this and you've got it made. It took me by surprise, the power of a good foot massage. The girls love it.
Anyway back to the show and we were honoured tonight to join us Miss Peterborough, who as it happens is a pretty good singer too, here she's singing Sandi Thoms "I wish I was a Punk Rocker".
So now we have the birthday boy himself sporting a gypsy cum gay biker motif today. Yes and that was iced water Gav (Chopper) tipped over his head.
Here's Ryan from Silverspace with a couple of mates with some pretty awesome improvised music. I was going to say they were jamming, but creating improvised music sound a lot more classy.

These Young Lives. Oh look there's John on bass from Dr A's blues consortium and The Hinge amongst others.
Finally Niqqi did some vocals in the Unity Jam and went on to perform a few songs toward the end.
So it's been a very full night which isn't bad considering bands had pulled out at the last minute.
Rock on dudes
Peace, Love, Unity

The Grass Roots Festival Day 3

Kicking off on Sunday Heros in the Park.I just love this girl. She is one of the nicest people I know. The first time I met her was at the Grass roots party at the Crown Lincoln Road and fell in love with her instantly. This is Jules Morgan.
The impossibly tall John Litchfield. Playing despite not having slept for 36 hours.
Hello there's Kerry playing with a band that's not Point Of Origin. In fact it's Jamblin.
Two of my dearest friends Richard and Abi playing as Istari. What a crowd pleaser.
Meanwhile on the main stage Wake. Fabulous.
Of course there's got to be more crowd pictures and here they are.
Stay tuned. There's not much further to go. I'm going to finish this if it kills me.

The Grass Roots Festival Day 2 cntd

This is the final part of Day 2 at the Grass roots Festival and of course you all want to see more of yourselves. so here you all are.
Then we had the Gangsters. What a feel good band they are. They just love playing their stuff you can tell.
Tarantism. Don't get me started on them.
Finally in the acoustic tent ... help who are these guys I'm losing track of who is who.

The Week Ahead

Greetings people of the beat, tune and harmony!

Post-Grassroots pack down and recovery made us miss a week out of our regular mailout schedule last week, so I'm glad to be able to resume normal service keeping you informed of what's on in the boro.

The festival was a definite success, we all hope you enjoyed yourselves as much as we did and we'd also like to take this opportunity to say a massive thank you to everybody who gave their time and positive energy to make the whole thing happen. We're all looking forward to next year already!


So what's on this week?

Tuesday

Tuesday nights is open mic/jam night at the Comet on Garton End Road, Dogsthorpe. Entrance is free and the people are friendly so if you've not been yet pop along and play or listen.

Wednesday

Wednesday brings us back to the XOO Bar, downstairs from City and County club on Priestgate. This is another friendly open mic session, this one hosted by James Chadwick. Entrance is free. Doors open 8pm.

Down the road at Lisboa (24 Lincoln Road, Peterborough) Pixie Folke Club is in session, with folk jamming and pixie like activities. Entrance is free and doors are 9pm till late.

Thursday

Unity at Lisboa this week brings a large line-up featuring acoustic music from Joe Watkin ( www.joewatkin.com ) and Moony (from Opaque). Bands on the night are Chatteris based Loop ( www.myspace.com/loopland ) and These Young Lives ( www.myspace.com/theseyounglives ). An acoustic jam will start proceedings at 8pm. Entrance is free and when the live music finishes DJ Urb continues with his weekly session to take you through to the early hours.

Vortex and Diesel City Promotions are continuing their Ptown Showcase nights this Thursday, with a line-up of three bands: The Escaped, Breakfall and Sever The Wicked. Doors open at 8:30 pm and entrance will cost you £3, or £2.50 with a flyer.

Friday
The Brewery Tap is hosting Soul Grooves on Friday night - a mix-up of soul to dance to till the early hours on offer. Entrance is free.

Saturday

Saturday sees the return of Pixie Sin to Lisboa. This time around the Pixie Skin crew are hosting The Big Hand ( www.thebighand.co.uk ), a ska four-piece coming all the way from Edinburgh! Tallulah Rendall ( www.tallulahrendall.com ) is also visiting the city for the event. Other acts on the bill include Istari with guest whistle from Terena, The Singing Monk, and DJ's Urb, Shaggy, The Okinawa Kid and the members of The Big Hand. Doors are 8pm till 5am and entrance is £3.

Also on Saturday Bish Bash Bosh are returning to Limit (POSH ground, London Road) for another outing of eclectic and hard electronic dance musics - hardcore, hard dance and breaks are on the bill this time around.

Sunday

Sunday nights is time for another of Rich's (Unity) Acoustic Sundays at Solstice. Music runs 9 till 11pm and the nights continue to showcase the cream of our city's acoustic talent. Entrance is free.

Meanwhile Deep Roots will be keeping things mellow in Lisboa - entrance is free and doors are open from 6pm till late.

....and Finally

Till next time - keep it happy.

Peace love unity and respect.

--
www.muddypromotions.org.uk
www.systemabuse.co.uk
www.play-skool.org.uk
www.boro-bands.co.uk

The Peterborough Festival

Amid the savage heat of the afternoon we find ourselves at the Peterborough Festival. Andy Laithwaite of the ET was on call so these photos will NOT be in the ET this week, His will. He's got a bigger one than I have. You should see his lens. And what a nice guy. Any old how first one stage, as far as we are concerned, The Evil One. I dare not even utter his name for fear of being turned to stone I am not worthy. Oh yes and there's Moony too. Totally irrelevent I know but ... such a hero. Lets go back in time a couple of days and here's Mike Da Hat, Simon and Tereena jamming Friday night in the Muddy tent. That is until we were told to shut the fcuk up, by the Shakespeare appreciation society next door. OK it was Michel Sans Chapeau that night. It's not welded to my head you know. I do take the hat off occasionally. Back to present day and Tereena scored a big one by persuading the powers that be, to let Benny T and Simon hit the decks with some techno mixing. It's a first. I think it went down well with everyone except the old folk were a bit bemused by it all. Dom begged me not to publish this photo, but I insisted that it would be great for his image. I've virtually destroyed James Chadwick (God I mentioned his name I'm dead) so why not destroy Dom as well. He's too nice for his own good anyway. I took an hour off to have a pint or five and found Melody and this grafitti. Those circus boys get around a bit. On bikes apparently.
Point of Origin were on straight after the Evil One. The crowd went wild. I got to share the stage with the guys. OK I was just the photographer but even so. Piper was going wild on the keyboards. Jodie saw fit to dash around the stage at the end. And Princess Abi? What can I say? Judging by the shouts from the crowd, she was very popular. I can't wait for Abid to come on stage with his new trumpet or trombone whatever he's been practicing on. He seems to be quite happy in the background but we want to see more of him. He's a difficult guy to photograph.
So after going home for a snack and a beer it's onto Richards acoustic night at the Solstice. John Litchfield, Nick Thompson, George, Richard, Shaggy and Irene Rae, provided a very entertaining and laid back ending to the weekend. There's Amber who claims to have suggested the little finger game way back when, so she reprised it tonight for us. Well it does it for me.
It's all been very hectic recently and I've had to do loads of work but I promise I'll be back on the Festival pics as soon as. Meanwhile those great guys "Sever The Wicked" pointed out to me that I got the groups round the wrong way so who the fcuk was the band that hasn't a title. let me know. That's Saturday in case you're wondering. So if that was you Email me quick so I can save my reputation.

Rock on mes enfants

Mike Da Hat

Grass Roots Festival Day 2

...and so we get to day 2 of The Grass Roots Festival and everything is going very smoothly. Opening proceedings on day 2 were "Sympathy for Mr Vengeance.Meanwhile kicking off in the acoustic tent Kate Wreyford. Actually when I say kicking off I don't mean Kate went on a bender and started a fight or anything, more like kicking off at a football match except she wasn't playing football. any hoo... here's Kate.
Now if there's anyone destined to become a rock star playing big stadiums it's Jimmy Kidnap. He's got the attitude , the poses and the pair of socks down the front of his jeans, allegedly. here he is fronting the fabulous Point Seven Pistol.
Yeah yeah yeah don't worry I haven't forgotten the workers er audience, here are you lovely people enjoying yourselves. BTW that security guard and his dog top left weren't as mean looking as they seem. I had them pose like that. I had to bribe the dog with scooby snacks to stop it wagging it's tail and licking everyone. Meanwhile on the QT Lisa begged me not to tell you she was reading "Nuts" magazine so I'll say nothing. And in the centre you'll see the lovely Clare without and i. It's her birthday Today (Saturday 1st July). So happy birthday Clare.
Is this Radicus?
Oh hello! It's Palava. Those nices dudes from Folk Wit Records. That's Gaff on the right with the hat. He's a kindred spirit to me, I wonder why?
You know if you want your rock intense and fast, look no further than these guys. This is "Sidearm". I love their party piece of changing over drummers without dropping a beat. Except the lead guitarist young Mitchell lost his sound and they had to go into a holding pattern while he fixed it, which sort of spoilt the effect. But I can assure you when it goes right it's brilliant.
If there was a prize for the festivals best facial hair, then it would have gone to our good friend Julian Stone. Here he is ripping it up in the acoustic tent.
We were really impressed by this band. Sever the Wicked. It was the first time we'd ever seen them and I almost didn't make it back to the acoustic tent to continue my photographic odyssey. It was one of the few times so far that I wasn't chasing from stage to stage with my camera. Fantastic.

I got back to the acoustic tent and the running order had all gone to pot. I don't mean "to pot" as in marijuana pot, but I guess it's as good an excuse as any, but certain acts booked failed to show so here's a few artists who filled in. That'll be Richard and Cornelius for starters then. This is what we've been waiting for, Circus featuring the talented Ali on Violin and the Evil one standing in on bass guitar.
Silverspace. The sounds this guy gets out of his guitar is incredible although I put it down to a million pounds worth of electronic wizardry at his finger tips and feet as well as his awesome ability.

Hooray! it's Tallulah Rendall. Anyone who has met her will agree she's fabulous. If you didn't get a chance to meet her then you are ever so lucky because she's coming back to playPixy Skin very soon.


Opaque on stage with The Evil One guesting on bass guitar.
Here's The Evil One again, this time in the acoustic tent, so far he's played on stage four times that I know of at this festival alone. Solo fill in set saturday afternoon, with Circus, with Opaque and now playing his allotted slot. Oh he did a very nice version of Tallulah. Sorry I meant Hallelujah. Anyway James Chadwick ladies and gentlemen. Just don't look into his eyes.
This is Tunguska Butterfly, arguably the weirdest named band at the festival so far, but having an odd name doesn't mean they're not brilliant.