Madness Information Service Online Newsletter Issue Number: 822 – Sunday 8th February to Saturday 14th February 2015
Love is in the air Madheads. It must be because you love Madness so much.
Full details of the much discussed Grandslam are nearly ready to roll out, with Madness this week posting a lovely picture of an Air Fix style model kit. It depicts a horse race track next to Fort Knox (the “Operation Grandslam” phrase coming from Goldfinger), with a big Madness M on the building, a sports car on the drive way, next to some cricketers on the boundaries who are taking over part of a large rugby playing field, with some deck chaired fans looking on.
With recent online rumours champing at the bit from Haydock, Chelmsford, Newmarket or Epsom and more horse fun venues, it looks like there will be plenty of race meet action this summer, and more gigs further afield than that, too. To be in pole position for the full and correct details of the Grandslam, be signed up here…
Once signed-up, sit back and wait for the full official news bulletin.
On to this week’s issue, and you’ll notice that this takes us up to Saturday 14th and Valentines day. We’re holding a mad meet across two London Venues this coming Saturday. From 1pm we’ll be at The Legendary Dublin Castle, Camden, where we are lending a hand to the reunion of John Hasler & The Skiff Skats. Join us for the lowdown hoe down.
Following that, from about 6pm, we start heading down the Northern Line, to Colindale and to The Chandos arms for The Silencerz. Join the fun there from 8pm. Jonathan & Daren West from MIS will be there, along with Crunch man Swanny. Alan, Maria and Clare from the All Things Madness Facebook page will also be around, so if you are popping along to a mad meet for the first time come and say hello.
This week, rounding out the love, we’ve a Lee Thompson piece he sent to the local newspapers and ourselves, all about his favourite love songs. Check it out.
Enjoy the read,
Jon Young, Rob Hazelby, Simon Roberts, Paul Williams
SHOWTIMES
See below for all forthcoming Madness and Madness related gigs and events. If there’s something we’ve missed off or you feel should be added then please let us know.
Madness
2015
March 12th – The Emirates Stadium – This week “The Gig Company” has announced Madness appearing at Suggs & Friends charity event in the line up (see below).
Operation Grand Slam… Summer 2015
http://madness.co.uk/grandslam/
Do you expect us to talk? More information coming soon from Madness.co.uk on a large number of events, subscribe to official madnews with your email and hear first.
November 2015
November 20th – 23rd 2014 – Minehead – The House Of Fun Weekender Five
Early bird tickets on sale now
Suggs
March 2015
12th March – An Evening With Suggs and Friends, in aid of Pancreatic Cancer UK. Held at The Emirates Stadium. At £160 a ticket we’re not sure if many MIS readers will be attending! http://www.thegigcompany.org/events/pcuk2015/
Near Jazz Experience
February
10th – NEAR JAZZ EXPERIENCE + Support + DJ
Indo 133 Whitechapel Rd, London E1 1DT *Free*
Visit: https://www.facebook.com/NearJazzExperience
The Silencerz ft. Lee Thompson
February
February 14th Chandos Arms, Colindale Barnet North London. From 8pm
February 21st The Black Horse, Barnet, (With Support from Reece)
Clang Group (Clive Langer) EP launch gigs
February
18th – The Dublin Castle Camden
19th – The Islington, 1 Tolpuddle Street, N1 0XT
The Skiff Skats
February
13th – Evening. 100 club Oxford Street London. Supporting the headline act, Doug Veitch. £16
14th – Afternoon. From 1pm till 5pm. The legendary Dublin Castle, Camden. The Band return to one of the venues they used to play in the 80’s and the ancestral home of Madness. With a Mad Meet and support from MIS DJ’s and a Crunch! DJ set from, Lee Swandale. £5 on the door.
BUY IT
Brand new T-Shirts, Merchandise
There are laurel leaf official polo’s in white, navy and black. T-shirts for all three beers; Night Boat, Lovestruck and Gladness. There are black laurel Beanie hats with the M crown logo, a new royal logo like Fez for gigs, blue and charcoal House Of Fun T-Shirts and a Mad Head design mug.
The black and red Dangermen Vs Invaders shirts are brilliant; half designed on the original 2004 Dangermen poster look with added flying saucers, making a really nice retro feel to the whole design. There is a blue Madhead Picture T-shirt with a slogan on, and some Oui, Oui, Si, Si merchandise still available.
2014 – Tour Programme.
http://madness.sandbaghq.com/home/2014-m-a-d-h-e-a-d-programme.html
Now only £8, and coming bundled with a link to 3 free Lee Thompson downloads, plus Rag and Bone Man download, from Madness.
It really is a really nice looking and well-written Mad-Head little bible. One all collectors should get hold of.
The Clang EP – 4 Track EP (Released Feb 16th on domino records)
Clive Langer revisits Shipbuilding, his legendary track with Robert Wyatt and 3 other new Langer group songs.
http://www.dominorecordco.com/uk/ep/20-11-14/the-clang-group-ep
SIGN OF THE TIMES
Items in the press that have caught our eye over the past week or so…
Top of The Pops 1980
This week’s Top of the pops on BBC4 is showing the 31/1/1980 episode, which featured the third recorded showing of Madness, and their one time appearance performing My Girl:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05279pn
It’s original airing is still available on the iPlayer for a few more days (3/1/1980). You’ll notice slightly differing intros from the DJ’s if you watch both:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04xkkbb
It Must Be Love-Lee – Exclusive full submitted transcript of the Barnet news article…
Hi
Just been asked by a local rag to come up with a list of favourite Love Songs & little VDay stories from my past.
[It] goes in the Barnet & Hendon Times next week to promote Chandos gig.
Best, Lee
1. Do you celebrate Valentine’s Day and why?
Almost Religiously. If I’m not touring, yes.I was in Australia in the 80’s on VDay so I phoned my wife & told her to go to the post office where I’d sent her an ‘All in One’ purple cat suit, with gold trinket type belt, well it was that time in that era & I was into the Nolan sisters at the time. In my mind I felt that she’d love it, this was not so & looking back, she was bloody right. Not sure what happened to it, but it was not her style & made it’s way straight to some charity shop! VDay is our time, although I’m not as romantic as I used to be, in fact, I’m a little Victor Mildrew, but my wife generally books us a week end in Paris or a meal in town & we’ll sing love songs to each other, then have a verbal punch up the following day……! x
2. Who will you be spending it with this year, and what will you be doing
This year V Day will be spent performing with my son in my latest musical venture The Silencerz in Colindale on the Barnet borders, in the company of my dear wife. (Oh, & at The Black Horse on Wood St. Sat 21st.Feb!)
3. Do you consider yourself a romantic? Why?
As I said earlier, not as much as I should. I used to be. I anonymously left a giant silk padded Valentine card outside my then girlfriends house, I’d filled it with hand written poems & – Bryan Ferry’s, then recently released album ‘These Foolish Thing’s’
4. What’s the most romantic thing you’ve ever done?
I’m not sure but, the above comes close. Ask my wife, she’s good at remembering those sort of things
5. Have you ever serenaded anyone special, or used your music to win someone over? When and what song?
Yes,around 3 or 4 million punters over the years, can’t recall which particular song, possibly My Girl.
LEE’s TOP FIVE LOVE SONGS
I Cant stop loving you – (Ray Charles)
I have always been a big fan of the Genius, this particular song seemed fitting for the occasion, beautiful string arrangements
Wake Up (& Make Love To Me) – Ian Dury & the Blockheads
Another lyrical genius & massive influence on me & mine. This was a song that Ian & the Blockheads would always open their set with & now the Silencerz carry that torch, on behalf of Ian & the Blockheads.
It’s a Lovers question (Clyde Mcphatter)
I’m a fan of many genre’s of music, but I always come back to 50’s R&B & in particular Doo Wop. If I could only sing I would use it more in the Silencers set. I had a compilation of Atlantic Hit’s & a mono turntable, this particular track I’d play over & over, in a little squat I had in 78′ great memories.
Love Potion No.9 (The Clovers)
In the mid 70’s there was a 50’s resurgence partly resting on the Friday evening TV series Happy Days, The Lords Of Flatbush, & a film American Graffiti. This song I have fond memories of sitting in the back row of the Forum……
Honey Love (The Drifters)
Another classic doo wop 54′ hit by the Drifter’s. It’s a favourite from those carefree day’s & one my girl & I would ‘try’ to harmonise to, in our own little way.
The Ian Dury which we play of course! Is the best of the bunch.
Lee Kix Thompson.
Madness and Rudimental unite for Pancreatic Cancer UK
In conjunction with the event, and Suggs’ continuous efforts to fundraise for Pancreatic Cancer UK, the charity has also recently announced him as their Ambassador.
Pancreatic Cancer UK is a charity very close to Suggs’ heart, having painfully lost his sister-in-law to pancreatic cancer. He says, ‘My wife Anne’s sister, Alanah, was such a big part of our lives. She radiated the most extraordinary, non judgemental joy everywhere she went. She is no longer here. Her illness and death from pancreatic cancer came as a huge shock to us all and at her wake we vowed to do something to help research into pancreatic cancer.
I am delighted to be an Ambassador for Pancreatic Cancer UK and will do all I can to support the charity.
For the third consecutive year “An evening with Suggs and friends” organised by the Gig Company will take place in Alanah’s memory.’
I REMEMBER WAY BACK WHEN
This week, MIS co-editor Rob Hazelby, goes back in time to report on what was going on in the world of Madness 5 years, 10 and 15 years ago this week.
5 years ago…
Issue Number 562 – Sunday 7th February – Saturday 13th February 2010
With news being rather thin on the ground this week we kicked things off with an apology for sending out such a lean issue.
On to the articles, and we reported that Retro Madness had managed to obtain a limited supply of the paperback edition of the “Suggs and The City” book – 5 months before it was due to be published!
The hardback edition was now out of print and no longer available at any stores of Waterstones up and down the UK. The paperback edition was due to hit store shelves around mid June.
The paperback edition was due to be priced by retailers at £14.99, and Retro Madness would be making it available at that price or the next two weeks.
Further in to this issue we passed on the news from worldscreen.com, who reported that Suggs and comedian Brian Pern were working on a cover of Ah-Ha’s 1987 hit “The Living Daylights”, which was due to be released in April.
We weren’t 100% convinced this report was totally accurate or true, but we promised to report back should be hear anything further.
On to gig news, and Jonathan passed on news detailing a possible performance by Madness at the B1 Maximum Arena, Russia, on the 28th April. Jonathan advised readers to be a little cautious on this one, as there was currently no mention of it on the official Madness web site.
10 years ago…
Issue number 300 – Sunday 6th February to Saturday 12th February 2005
This week we celebrated our achievement at reaching issue number 300. Those of you subscribed for any length of time would probably have been aware that it was actually issue 299, as due to a numbering problem way, way back, an issue number was accidentally skipped.
More exciting news followed, with the announcement that after many months the new all-singing, all-dancing MIS web site was now up and running. MIS webmaster, Simon Roberts, had performed a fantastic job, meaning the wait was certainly worthwhile.
On to the articles, and this issue we started-off with a lowdown on the new and improved MIS web site, where we explained what was new, what had been enhanced, and what had been removed. The biggest addition to the site was the massive file archive where you could download or stream a huge selection of non commercial Madness videos and TV appearances.
Moving on, and the next article gave the heads-up that four new songs had been added to the Smash Jukebox over on the Chas Smash.com web site.
The four new songs were:
– Viva Londinium
– Hoodle La La
– Why be Brutal
– The Wizard
All songs were given the in-depth treatment by the one and only Jonathan Young.
This issue Jonathan Young also took a look at gnod.net, gnoosic.com and music-map.com – three web sites set up with the aim of finding you music of a similar genre to that of what you already listen to.
Most of the music that the sites selected seemed fairly obvious, but we’re still baffled at music-map’s suggestion that we might like Sophie Ellis-Bextor following our keying-in of Madness.
We finished-off this issue with a reminder that on Sunday 13th Feb Mr. Chas Smash, along with Jerry Dammers, Mark Lammar, Ian Broudie and Chris Rowley would be attending a benefit gig at Cargo, in aid of the Tsunami disaster.
15 years ago…
Issue number 38 – Sunday 6th February to Saturday 12th February 2000
The biggest news this week had to be that Virgin were planning to re-release an updated version of the 1992 singles album, `Divine Madness` featuring digitally re-mastered tracks and new sleeve artwork. We felt that whilst it would be nice to have these re-mastered tracks, we couldn’t help thinking that Virgin would have been better off spending their money elsewhere rather than regurgitating old material in an effort to squeeze more money out of the die-hard fans who would buy any new release just to add it to their collection.
How about putting together `Divine Madness` on DVD with digitally re-mastered video and sound? Make use of that extra storage space with interviews, lyrics, and out-takes. Perhaps if Virgin were feeling particularly generous, they could have actually helped the lads out and have given them some promotion for their forthcoming single. Had no one at Virgin realised that the reason `Johnny The Horse` and `Wonderful` did so poorly was because only the online Madness community knew they were released!!
With the prospect of a new Madness single being released, fans were expecting a promo to be doing the rounds a few weeks before the official single release of ‘Drip Fed Fred’. The fanbase would not be disappointed, as Nuttyboys.com reported that a test pressing and promo single were now doing the rounds.
As the release of the next single was now just around the corner, the band were cranking up the promotional bandwagon, and had the following appearances booked in for the rest of month:
February 9 Madrid – Musica Si TV (Johnny The Horse)
February 10 Madrid TVE 1 JTH Live Midnight
February 11th BBC Radio 3 @ 7pm (?) 30 mins live, 4 new songs, 2 old
February 18th TFI Friday Drip Fed Fred
February 19th CD:UK (to be confirmed)
February 25th Suggs – A Question Of Pop
And finally, the release date for `Drip Fed Fred` had been altered by Virgin Records. If all went to plan, DFF should see the light of day on Monday 28th February. Apparently the delay was due to Virgin deciding to actually promote this single. Our fingers were crossed in the hope that it would get the chart position it deserved.
Onto this weeks’ edition of the bulletin and we had a brief review of Nutty Sounds 1 and 2 from Nahuel Foppoli, details from Virgin regarding the re-vamped release of `Divine Madness` due to hit the record stores sometime in March, fanzine information from Juliet `Ska-Mad`, Suggs chatting about Ian Dury and The Blockheads, details of the current stock of Madness goodies for sale on the Music Capital website, and a review of the recent `events` that took place during the airing of `Drip Fed Fred` on the BBC’s `National Lottery Show`.
Rob Hazelby
MIS – MAD MEET THIS SATURDAY
This coming Saturday we are Mad Meeting for both gigs that day. The itinerary is as follows.
The Return of The Skiff Skats – A Lowdown Hoe down of Country Skiffle Cow Punk.
(Featuring John Hasler & Cousin Hector) £5 on the door in the back room
1pm to 5pm Dublin Castle – Camden Town. Featuring DJing from MIS and Crunch! DJ set from Swanny.
The Mad meet continues till around 6pm then it’s on to the Northern Line and travelling to The Chandos Arms, Colindale, 1 street from the tube station 6 minute walk.
The Silencerz featuring Lee Thompson. – Rock n Roll, Blockheads to Madheads tunes & Ska
Join us at either leg of the Mad Meet on Saturday 14th.
TWEETS OF A DOVE
Snippets from the Twitterverse that have caught our interest…
Chrissy Boy @CBoyForeman
“Please have a look at this petition, it means a lot to me: https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/council-must-help-save-brighton-hippodrome?source=twitter-share-button … via @38_degrees”
Woody Woodgate @woodymadness
“I’m supporting #timetotalk Day to break the silence around mental health. Join me by taking your 5 on the 5th”
TIME…
That’s almost it for this week’s issue of the MIS. We leave you with an amusing Radio tidbit from Daren West…
“Elsewhere…this morning on Radio 6 Sean Keaveny does a brekkie show with a ‘small claims court’ feature. This involves a member of the public talking about having contact with a famous person in more humble surroundings eg in 1977 when working at shell fish bar in Scarborough I served 4 cod & chips to Les Dawson, that sort of thing.
The guy phoning in today said he was at a recording of a pop show back in the 1980s and during the break he was having a pee & who should stand next to him but the pianist from Madness, Mike Barson. The DJ then said “he’s rather large isn’t he…? A large pianist”. He then used “the large pianist” phrase 3 or 4 times during the rest of the conversation – the poor bloke phoning in didn’t realise fully what had been said!!”
For those of you attending this coming Saturday’s Mad Meet, we’ll see you at The Dublin Castle.
Have a good week!
Jon Young, Rob Hazelby, Simon Roberts, Paul Williams
(With thanks to Daren West and Lee Thompson)
The Author
