Madness Information Service Online Newsletter Issue Number: 829 – Sunday 29th March to Saturday 4th April 2015
Last Sunday Madness appeared at The London Palladium,to entertain the audience of ITV variety show “Sundy Night at The Palladium.” The episode, hosted by “Bradley Walsh” (of Whom Chrissy Boy said “He was class.”) also featured Olly Murs, and a cast of Billy Elliot performers.
Madness’ management have confirmed that at present the planned TV transmission date for us this is to be 9pm, Sunday May the 3rd on ITV. We’ll remind you again in a couple of weeks so that you don’t miss it.
Jeni Leach, posting in the All Things Madness group said… “My Son and his lovely partner had priority tickets for this tonight and [had] no idea who was performing until getting inside. 2 tracks..Our House and It Must Be Love. They have had a wicked night.”
Also this week, Cathal Smyth announced that the first single from A Comfortable Man is – Do You Believe In Love? You can hear it here https://youtu.be/rhlloggQgMU
On Amazon it’s currently listed as available for download from March 25th.
Now, on with this week’s issue.
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).
GRANDSLAM
“Sporting theatres jumping with joy is the goal. Grandslam Madness – the greatest open air tour in the history of Rock & Roll…”
May
29 – Lincoln City Football Club
30 – Gloucester Rugby Club
June
3 Chelmsford City Racecourse
6 – Portsmouth, Fratton Park
26 – Newmarket Racecourses
27 – Doncaster Racecourse
28 – Hove, Sussex County Cricket Club
July
2 – Silverstone Circuit
3 – St Helens, Haydock Park Racecourse
4 – Carlisle Racecourse
5 – Montrose, East Links, Scotland
9 – Epsom Downs Racecourse
10 – Chepstow Racecourse
11 – Rhyll Outdoor Events Arena
September
11 – Canterbury, Kent County Cricket Club
12 – Bristol, Gloucester County Cricket Club
13 – London, On Blackheath
18 – Leeds, Yorkshire County Cricket Club
25 – Wolverhampton
26 – Chester-le-Street, Durham County Cricket Club
November 2015
November 20th – 23rd 2014 – Minehead – The House Of Fun Weekender Five
Early bird tickets on sale now
Near Jazz Experience
April
* New * 21st – NEAR JAZZ EXPERIENCE + Support + DJ
Indo 133 Whitechapel Rd, London E1 1DT *Free*
Visit: https://www.facebook.com/NearJazzExperience
May
* New * 19th – NEAR JAZZ EXPERIENCE + Support + DJ
Indo 133 Whitechapel Rd, London E1 1DT *Free*
Visit: https://www.facebook.com/NearJazzExperience
The Silencerz ft. Lee Thompson
May
9th The Junction, Cambridge, Support Terry Hall (DJ set)
The Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra
July
24th Llangollen Town Hall, Denbrighshire, Wales (Fringe Festival Event)
August
1st The Garage Highbury, London
Cathal Smyth
May
* New * 14th Shepard’s Bush Hall London. W12.
Deaf School
June
5th – The Garage, Highbury, London
BUY IT
Lovestruck – (7 inch single – Buy on Record Store Day
April 18th In Stores.
A 1,000 copy limited edition 7” of ‘Lovestruck’, which has never been available on vinyl, backed with ‘Le Grand Pantalon’, best known for its use in a 2011 Kronenbourg TV ad, and which is also making its vinyl debut.
Comes with a unique insert, a ‘Madness Presents’ 3D ‘Love Struck’ Toy Theatre, a replica of a classic Punch & Judy puppet theatre.
In addition to iconic London characters like a Pearly King and Queen and Punch & Judy themselves, the interior of the 3D theatre features depictions of items and characters relating to Madness and their songs, including pith-helmeted soldiers (‘Night Boat’), bottles of Madness Brewing Company beer, a rollercoaster (‘House Of Fun’), terraced houses (’Our House’), and many more. The character collage was created by Peter Quinnell, and the toy theatre is being manufactured by Benjamin Pollock’s Toy Shop.
‘Lovestruck’ has been re-mastered for its vinyl debut from the original ½” tapes.
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.
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
A Comfortable Man – Cathal Smyth solo album. Signed Packages Now Available.
Remaining limited LP’s, CD and download. Album available May 11th. * New date & Pre-order for Signed edition *
Signed Super Deluxe Bundles are now available, containing the Limited LP, CD and download editions. The preview track and single download instantly, and you also get a pack of 10 art postcards. The album is available in a Digipack CD with 8 page booklet.
More info at: http://cathalsmyth.tmstor.es/ Price – £28.99
If you attended the Wilton’s music hall gig and already have the LP, or if you are only interested in certain items there are a range of other buy options available. Signed CD’s separately. Etc.
Do You Belive In Love – Cathal Smyth solo single. * New *
“Dear Friends Do you believe in Love? Why wouldn’t you? What would our worlds be like without love? I simply couldn’t bear it? Could you? To begin, ‘Do You Believe In Love?’ is to be the first single from the album. You can hear it on Youtube, and spotify. Cathal Smyth”
In Your Mind – Woody Woodgate solo album.
Pre-Order Now on Amazon.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00TZEMCMQ
OR IF YOU WOULD LIKE A SIGNED ALBUM INSTEAD http://www.propermusic.com/product-details/Woody-Woodgate-In-Your-Mind-Ltd-Autographed-Edition-188454
Album released June 1st.
(website **Now live**. Details to follow) 13 tracks with new band line up and vocalist Dan Shears.
We’re All Going To Brighton (In The Mix preview video of the new sound)
SIGN OF THE TIMES
Madness star Cathal Smyth unveils new song ‘ Do You Believe In Love?’
“It was a sunny morning, the kind of morning that you’re grateful to be alive, I thought of her and wished she was with me,” Smyth said of the song. “Happy simply because I loved her, I picked up my guitar, strummed an A chord followed by a G and then the birds started singing and the song wrote itself.”
A Comfortable Man was recorded in London with producers Charlie Andrew, Paul Powell and Felix Quine and mixed by Alan Winstanley.
Suggs on band’s biggest ever tour ahead of their Chelmsford City Racecourse gig
“It’ll be the greatest tour since Boudacia. We’ll be going across the countryside rampaging and pillaging. We have our people working on designing a chariot – even as we speak,” he laughs
“If you had told me this when I was a kid I’d have laughed so loudly my socks would have flown off. Of course it’s remarkable and a privilege to still be doing this funny old business that we do.”
Q Magazine, April 2015 „100 Records That Shaped Modern Music. Chosen By The Stars”
Suggs (Madness) – The Clash – ‘The Clash’ (1977)
This album came out when I was 16 years old. I lived on a council estate opposite Capital Radio [in Euston] where I saw these letters sprayed 10-feet high that said ‘The Clash 1977’. The next thing, there was an article in the Melody Maker and it had this photo of them with their backs to the camera, like they’d just been arrested.
The first thing I noticed was they had straight trousers, which was very unusual, and they had attitude. When I was about 13 or 14, we’d decided to get our hair cut really short and start wearing ‘60s skinhead-y suedehead-y clothes. Punk came along and we had short hair and straight trousers; we weren’t punks but we looked the part. It was a rather terrifying time – you could get chased up the road by a gang of teddy boys cos punk, if nothing else, endangered a feeling of anti-royalism. It was the Queens’s Jubilee in 1977 and wearing straight trousers made you anti-royalist [in their eyes] and everybody had the right to chase you up the road and boot you in the bollocks and stab you. Ma mate got stabbed just for having blue hair, and that’s a fact. It was tribal – what you were wearing could get you in a lot of trouble.
Around that time, I went to the Roxy Club with my mate. We saw a band called Eater, whose average age was 14, and I thought, ‘Wow! These are kids my age’ – it wasn’t status quo, and they were wearing gear that wasn’t worn by Status Quo either! Don Letts was the DJ; they had a couple of records by The Ramones but I think The Damned’s New Rose was the only other punk record they had, so he was playing a lot of reggae in between the bands. Me and my mates already liked reggae at that point. The reason I cite the Clash album is that it sums up that whole period; the freshness, liveliness and the idea that reggae music was a part of the firmament of British pop music. Cos it had never really crossed over before.
It made me want to start a band. We were just starting to think about making music and we loved the energy of punk, but the trash metally business wasn’t our cup of tea. But The Clash proved you could have groove and that was the point; we liked a bit more groove and The Clash gave us that inspiration.
And when you heard lines like, ‘London’s burning with boredom now’, they were very potent words. With songs such as Police & Thieves… the riots were going on at the Notting Hill Carnival, so it just seemed to sum up that feeling. What it ultimately meant is neither here nor there – that’s the great thing about pop music, it’s about the ephemera of the moment. And when I put that album on now, it takes me right back, like all great albums do.
Our thanks to Jacek Gajewski for the above transcription.
MIS FEATURE – MAD MEN WENT TO MOW
In a wonderful publicity stunt ahead of The Blackheath festival later this year, Madness turned on Black Heath last Sunday with mowers to prepare the grass for the event.
The resultant photo shoot appeared in The Metro, London’s widely circulated, free paper, and many other local papers and new outlets around the south London area.
The wonderful photographs which show, Chris, Suggs, Bedders and Woody hard at work having a lark, are available to view on many sites selling news photographs. They evoke the scenes from Take it Or Leave it, back when Chris used to mow, or as Suggs also mentions in his autobiography, he also worked on trees for the council gardens departments back in the day, too.
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/galleries/events/543700311
http://paimages.net/?search_0=OnBlackheath%20Festival%20photocall%20-%20London
So, if you see some uneven patches on the ground when you attend the Blackheath Festival later this year, you might know who mowed it so. They could have caused more mayhem though. We were told the team considered hiring Drive on Mowers for this day. We can imagine what a formation bumper car free for all that might have become, mowing the Letters M A D N E S S into the lay of the grass like tabby cats marking their territory out. The grass may have got off lightly.
Suggs on Blackheath on Video
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10155456500165624
Madness are no longer available to do your landscaping. Try the tribute band Mow Madness instead.
Jonathan Young
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 569 – Sunday 28th March – Saturday 3rd April 2010
We began this issue with some sad news, as it was announced that Madness’ former manager Matthew Sztumpf had sadly passed away. Matthew, who also worked with The Smiths and Swing Out Sister collapsed from a brain aneurysm a week ago and passed away on Sunday.
Another former Madness Manager, John ‘Kellogs’ Kalinowski and Mark Knopfler manager, Paul Crockford both paid tribute to Matthew, with Paul commenting;
“Matt was one of the good guys in the business. He did the best for his acts with honesty, dignity and most importantly, a sense of humour. He will be sorely missed.”
Moving on, and we had much jollier news to pass on as The Valle Theatre Company, Cheshunt, announced that they would be performing the Our House Musical. The production would take place on the 3rd and 4th of April at the Broxbourne Civic Hall.
Corinne Vallé, principal of the Vallé Theatre Company said: “Even if you’re not familiar with the music of Madness, you can’t help but fall in love with this show. It’s so funny and endearing, and the cast have really enjoyed putting it together. We’re really excited for opening night – we hope as many people as possible will come and see it.”
Next, it was over to Mick Jenner with a detailed review of the recent Big Ten gig, which was held at The Dublin Castle on the 21st March. With the band playing past midnight on a Sunday evening it was likely that many would have given the gig a miss or would have left early. After all, for a lot of people they’d need to be up for work in the morning.
Mick rounded off his review by commenting;
“As I hurried to Camden Town tube station with ringing in my ears and the uncomfortable feel of the icy cold air on my sweat soaked Fred Perry, my voice had almost gone completely. I just about managed to muster up the energy for two words to sum up Big 10….
Oi, Oi!!”
Further on, and we had yet more Our House musical news, as Ian Taylor of the Mad Not Mad fanzine got in touch to tell us that the school he was head of year at had just finished a three night run of the show. With a cast of 65, a full band and chorus, plus Ian playing the roll of dad, he said it was something of a dream come true to be following in Suggs’ steps.
Elsewhere Jonathan Young reported on a special live fan-compiled album that had been put together by himself, Stuart Wright, and Fred & Emilee and his band “Indeed”.
The project had come together to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the sad passing of Ian Dury.
Featuring 18 tracks, the album could be downloaded from the MIS web site.
We brought this issue to a close with the news that Jean Pierre Boutellier was busy organizing a France-based Madmeet for the 14th of May. This would take place before the Madness concert due to take place in Paris later that day.
10 years ago…
Issue number 307 – Sunday 27th March to Saturday 2nd April 2005
With the Easter break well and truly underway, everyone seemed to be away from their keyboards, and instead, out enjoying the weather.
This was reflected in the short issue we had this week.
We started off this week by taking a look at the Official One Step Behind web site. The band had recently set up a web forum, giving fans the opportunity to chat with the band members, and to chat with other fans.
The band had also put together a downloads section, enabling visitors to obtain live and studio recordings of their covers.
Moving on, and we detailed the full line-up for the Badfest festival, which ran fromt he 29th to the 31st of July. With bands such as The Riffs, Big 10, Bad Manners, Jerry Dammers and many many more, the £45 ticket price for the three days seemed like an absolute bargain.
Next-up we highlighted a thread that had originally appeared on the official Madness messageboard, and had been answered by Lee and Chris.
A Madness fan was in search of the best place to pick up a Harrington Jacket. Lee and Chris were not only able to point the person in the right direction, but gave details of a short Madness tour, which you can find below…
“If you [or anyone else] want a Madness mini tour of the immediate area, the Mac Bar in Camden road used to be called the Eagle pub, which is where Dave Robinson took us for the legendary pint before signing us to Stiff records. The Entrance to the bar we were in [the saloon bar-ask your grandparents about public bars and saloon bars] can be found in the Royal College street side of the pub. Near the entrance you will notice some metal stairs which lead down to a basement in which we rehearsed for our first headlining tour in 1979.
Just next to this on the junction of Royal College Street and Camden Road was a clothes shop called “Swanky Modes” [now a restaurant] which Clive Langer’s wife Mel ran with Willie Walters. Mel and Clive also lived above the shop.
Head back down Royal College Street towards Kings Cross and you may notice a dilapidated car showroom which is where Suggs did his intro piece for “Shut Up” on the Madness video.
With that on your left glance down at the row of houses on your right and you will find it is the same row of houses the we “nutty trained” towards in “Grey Day” and is also the cover of “Divine Madness”.
Finally if you can find the steps that lead down to the canal this is where we did the video links for “Los Palmos Seven” and where I had the frogmans flippers on for “It Must be Love”.
Finish your afternoon/day off with a visit to the pie and mash shop on Royal College Street a few doors away from where you started off. Castle’s Pie and Mash-229 Royal College Street. Phone-020 7485 2196. Don’t forget to say Chrissy Boy sent you for a total blank”
Going back to the subject of clothing, and our next section came courtesy of the Warrior Clothing web site, who were kind enough to let us know what they’d been up to, and what new items they had in stock.
If you were (and in fact, still are!) after some good quality mod/2tone style clothing, this is one place you’ll want to visit.
We finished off this week’s issue by re-printing an exchange of words between one fan who was grumbling about the cost of a gig ticket being £27.00 (remember those days!), and Chas, who put a cheeky twist on the subject.
15 years ago…
Issue number 45 – Sunday 26th March to Saturday 1st April 2000
The other week it was described as looking `gleaming`, now it was back to being `totally unlikely`. In a recent update via E-mail, Total Madness Mailing List Co-Maintainer, Adele Hargreaves reported that the bi-annual shin-dig (Madstock to the majority of you) may not take place.
Apparently Vince Power at The Mean Fiddler (the organisers of the Madstock shows) wanted to present an `80’s Revival Festival`. Madness rightly didn’t want to be part of this as they felt they were a `today` band.
Other news was that the US tour mentioned a few issues ago may be organised to co-incide with the Stateside release of Wonderful. No further news was available, but if we heard anything we would let you know.
Looking further ahead, and Adele informed us that we should `start saving our pennies` as a Christmas 2000 tour of the UK was looking possible. Apparently the lack of appearance in Scotland last year had also been passed on to the band.
Adele finished by informing us that we should ignore all those who touted `Wonderful` as the last release from the lads. From what she told us, `the band were hoping to get back into the studio within the next year`.
We started off this week’s issue with an article from Mr. G, who emailed in to let us know that his Magnificent Seven web site had received a massive update, and that there were now 28 mp3s available for download that went all the way back to 1980, and included rare footage of Mike Barson’s farewell concert at the Lyceum in 1983.
We’d had Madmeets held in numerous locations over the years, London, Scotland, New York, Washington DC, and now thanks to Mr Carden and Mr. Foley, Ireland had been changed forever by the antics of a few of its residents in its first ever Madmeet.
The Vince Foley titled O’ Meet took place in Bruxelles bar with the juke box that contained ‘Complete Madness’, Various Ska compilations and the original versions of Under My Thumb, Apeman and Goodbye Blackberry Way.
Moving on, we next took a look at the latest line-up of gigs for Madness tribute band “One Step Behind”. These guys were so well organised that dates for 2001 were already being organised, such was the demand for their Madness inspired antics.
For those of you out there who missed the few gigs Ian Dury and his Blockheads played a month or so back, you’d be pleased to know that more dates had since been announced for later in the year. These would of course be dependant on the health of Ian.
We finished off this week’s issue with news that Madness fan Scatty was looking into organising a Madness festival. A date of June 11th had been pencilled in, and would consist of the following:
– A Madwalk (see the Madness related sites in and around Camden)
– A Madness quiz (pub quiz style, about Madness, with cash prizes)
– A Madness raffle, (with the possibility of a few signed items)
– Madness stalls (chances for maddies to get hold of those rare bits they want)
– Video shows of “Take it or Leave it, Madstocks, Greatest hits, interviews & dance craze, as well as any other videos of interest.
– A tribute band, (and maybe if possible, a karaoke)
And to round off the day nicely, a ska/madness disco which would raise money for “radio king’s” (a hospital radio station) in the process.
Would this ambitious project ever get off the ground? Only time would tell.
Rob Hazelby
LIVE AND INTENSIFIED
In this week’s Live and Intensified we pass the reigns over to Mark Adamson, who brings us reviews on the recent Deaf School gigs that took place in Tokyo
Take it away, Mark…
Deaf School – Tokyo – 14 & 15 March 2015
Deaf School didn’t make it to Japan back in the day, but for the second time in four years their loyal and extremely enthusiastic Japanese fans showed that they are keen to make up for lost time at two shows at the galleried Koenji High venue in central Tokyo.
Support act Banda Planetario (the self-styled Japanese Deaf School!) were the perfect warm-up as Deaf School started in now-customary fashion with Clive Langer’s thrashing guitar overture leading in to Last Night, before exploding into Get Set Ready Go – the Tokyo roar of approval for Miss Bette Bright’s stylish entry to the stage possibly exceeding that for Enrico Cadillac Jr a few minutes earlier!
As ever, Deaf School worked hard and played hard in a 100-minute set that had many highlights on both nights. The singers were on top spontaneous form, the first night Enrico ending up on his back at one point from the sheer energy of the performance (“What am I doing here?”) and Bette taking the opportunity to place her stiletto firmly in the middle of his chest! She let him get up eventually to hold the crowd in the palm of his hand as he controlled the pauses in Cocktails at 8 as only he can, ramping up the excitement to another level.
But it wasn’t just the theatre of the show where Deaf School excelled. All three vocalists (Steve ‘Average’ Lindsey sang Darling) performed superbly and elsewhere on the stage Ian Ritchie’s sax, Langer’s guitar and The Reverend Max Ripple’s keyboards were underscored by Steve Lindsey’s bass and Gregg Braden’s thumping drums, the whole band coming together to produce two epic and pulsating shows. A small visiting contingent of battle-hardened UK fans marked Saturday night as one of the best Deaf School shows they had seen in 40 years (maybe the best) – but remarkably the Sunday night show at least matched it.
Big thanks to Japan for the welcome they gave Deaf School and to Tetsuya Nakatani of Vinyl Japan for again promoting the gigs in a wonderful city – giving the fans and the band another eastern weekend they will never forget.
Deaf School next perform on Friday 5 June at The Garage, Islington, London (www.deafschoolmusic.com)
Mark Adamson
Next week Mark brings us a review of the recent Clang Group gig, which took place in Soho on the 27th March.
TWEETS OF A DOVE / THAT FACEBOOK
Woody Woodgate @woodymadness
“Rest in peace Ian Dury, who passed away 15 years ago yesterday”
TIME…
We’re almost done for this week, but before we go we do have a few bits to pass in your direction.
First-up, and if you’re a fan of Cathal Smyth’s solo venture you may be interested to learn that according to Digital Spy, “Further live dates and festival shows” will follow.
Naturally, as soon as any new dates are revealed we’ll publish them in a subsequent issue of the MIS.
And finally…
Terry Edwards will be appearing at Rhoda Dakar’s gig on April 5th, which takes place at the Jazz Café, Camden.
Terry will be on stage at 2pm, along with Horace Panther and The Beat Goes Bang. The much-loved Paul Tadman will be on Bass.
And with that, we’re done for another issue.
Until next week, take care,
Jon Young, Rob Hazelby, Simon Roberts, Paul Williams
(With thanks to Jeni Leach, Mark Adamson and Jacek Gajewski)
The Author
