So when I was on tour back in October, we stopped off in Glasgow to play at King Tut’s Wah Hut (such a great name for a venue). And to play an in-store at the mighty Avalanche Records, a great indie record store in central Glasgow.
Avalanche Records very kindly allowed me to film an episode of my TV show in their little upstairs rehearsal space. Malcolm Middleton and Emma Pollock came along and played brand new unreleased songs… which was very exciting for me as Arab Strap & Delgados were on the first ever mixtape I ever received from Tom Smithard, the friend who was responsible for getting me into music, and were therefore two of the first bands I ever got into. And Pictish Trail, who played a medley of Hot Chip tunes, is an old friend who sometimes plays in King Creosote’s band, with whom I’ve toured several times. Good folks one and all, and it was an honour to share a room with them and hear them play.
So I was on tour through October, and I had some great support acts, especially two of my favorite new artists: Peggy Sue, and Jay Jay Pistolet. (I love Jay Jay’s music so much I joined his band…) Anyway, I thought it would be fun to get us together in a room somewhere and film us playing songs. We were also joined by another favorite singer of mine who I’ve toured with before, the excellent Mechanical Bride.
Anyway. We were all playing at the Hoxton Bar and Grill on Monday evening, so what better way to spend Monday afternoon than playing songs on a light-up dancefloor? Jay Jay’s manager Jay’s fiancee Alice works in a cool bar in Hoxton, next door to the Hoxton Bar and Grill, and got us the dancefloor; I went out and bought a camera (Argos FTW) and borrowed a soundcard from Tom, and away we went.
Turns out making on-line TV shows is REALLY difficult. I’m not actually that convinced this first episode of what will hopefully be a regular New Thing is really technically very good, but I think the performances are great. Hopefully future episodes will feature more proficient camerawork, lighting and editing; watch this space.
Mp3s! Please share these around and tell people to check out the video.
… Anyway. I’ve actually also filmed a second episode of the J.W.N.T. with Pictish Trail, Emma Pollock and Malcolm Middleton, which will be going online soonish, so that’ll be nice. Who should I get on in the future? comments please.
Lots of love,
Jeremy
PS just to presage a few very obvious questions; No, this isn’t a continuation of Welcome To Our TV Show, it’s a New Thing and whilst there are similarities, it is not the same thing. WTOTS is a collaborative effort between myself and Fay Buzzard (who does most of the work, work which I now extra-appreciate the sweaty difficulty of), accept no substitutes. It’s still a going concern, we have one filmed episode waiting to be finished off and lots of plans for stuff in the New Year. So watch this space!
