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.
24 – 26th – Tunes in the Dunes, Peranporth Beach, Cornwall. (Madness appear on the Sunday.)
June
7th – Market Rasen, Lincolnshire
8th — Chepstow racecourse
9th – Carlisle, Bits Park
15th – Kenworth House, Hampstead. This Massive North London home coming gig for Madness XL features a full scale orchestra with the band.
16th – June – Isle of Wight Festival
21st – New Market Racecourse
22nd – Lingfield Park
28th -Franklin Gardens, Northampton
29th – Newcastle Racecourse plate day
July
5th – Port America, Galicia, Spain
6th – Vida Festival, Barcelona, Spain
12th- Taunton, Vivary Park
20th – Doncaster Racecourse
24th – Sanddown Racecourse
August
17th – Newbury Racecourse
18th – Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh
20th – Belfast Custom Square
23rd – Inverness
24th – Montrose – East Links
26th – Clapham Common, XL South London festival. With “Special” Guests.
30th – Wolverhampton
November
Friday 29th – Monday 2nd December – House of Fun Weekender 2019
Buy It
Before We Was We: The Making of Madness by Madness
The idea is a simple one, that came to us one evening back in July.
Bands as Football Teams, Football Teams as Bands.
We now have over 400 badges, working with friends and guest designers, setting up an exhibition at The National Football Museum in Manchester https://bandsfc.com/”
Bands FC have given a large number of badges to the band to give away on the Sound of Madness tour. So, if you’re buying something before or after one of the gigs don’t forget to pick up your free badge.
New Arrivals at The Madstore
If you missed the House Of Fun or you need another fix get your hands on the event range NOW at The MAD STORE with 20% OFF whilst stocks last!
NEW STOCK JUST LANDED!
2018 Christmas Sweaters, track jackets, polos, fez hats, tea towels, badge sets, dekker hats, beanie hats the list goes on….!
Lee ‘Kix’ Thompson is a most unlikely character. Early career choices had him spend a year in Borstal. He still hasn’t found the receipt for his first saxophone. Luckily, he met two other unlikely characters: Mike ‘Barso’ Barson and ‘Chrissy Boy’ Foreman, who shared his interests of graffiti, train hopping and music.
One Man’s Madness, a feature length rocku-docu-mockumentary directed by Jeff Baynes, tells the story of Madness saxophonist Lee Thompson, told by Lee and his fellow Madness band mates, his family, friends and musicologists, who strangely all look a little like him! From meeting Barso and Chrissy Boy, and later Suggs, Chas, Woody and Bedders, to becoming one of Britain’s most iconic and successful bands, this joyous and light-hearted film follows the path of Lee’s life through his lyrics and songs, including such Madness classics as The Prince, Embarrassment, House Of Fun, Lovestruck and NW5.
Two CD set. Original soundtrack to the 2018 documentary about Madness saxophonist Lee Thompson. Includes tracks from Madness, Crunch, ‘Thommosina Leigh’, Ian Dury, and the Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra. Including Hidden Tracks.
Danceable and delightful, this debut album of the band’s much loved original songs pushes on through, breaking the mould of standard ska cover band. Catchy tunes and powerful brass and rhythm section make this a must-listen. Featuring Lee Thompson.
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: 771 – Sunday 16th February to Saturday 22nd February 2014
News for the Irish was that Suggs had added two more solo shows in Derry and Belfast, to the already announced Dublin solo show. Wales also got a visit with Cardiff, while the sales at Bury St Edmonds had pushed for a second return date to satisfy demands.
Moving on to the Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra, and Dave Robinson told us the release date for Bangarang was currently set for March 24th. We expected to see the edited video for the single arrive online at the end of this month. The band also had some interesting festival dates coming up, but for now Dingwalls in Camden on the 13th of March was looking like being the single launch gig. If you popped over to the band’s official facebook, and mentioned you’d bought your ticket there, son of the main man, young Kye Thompson was now running a competition there to draw names for a signed album.
Further on from that, we had a ticket competition for next Saturday’s gig in Walton on Thames, South of London, by keyboard master Louis Vause, who had his Birthday this weekend.
We brought this issue to a close by revealing that The Magic Brothers were now in the process of working on the string arrangements as part of the work towards their second album. The night before this issue went out Woody posted a video to his Facebook page, showing a 1 minute clip of the string session for the forthcoming second album “In your Mind”, with Mike Kearsay present with the brothers working on the arrangements with a quartet of string players working in the booth. It sounded great.
10 years ago…
Issue 511 – Sunday 15th February to Saturday 21st February 2009
We began this week’s issue with doubts that the Julian Temple Madness film would ever make it to a DVD release following this message over on the Madness Central Forum;
“Last I talked with Chris on the subject, he was saying that there’s something about the Hackney footage being relegated to TV broadcast so it can’t be used for the box set, and that some of what Julian Temple spliced into the concert footage made no sense (like an elderly black man sweeping up during the line “In the beginning was a fear of the immigrant” in Norton Folgate – which incidentally is about Irish immigrants).”
News also came in regarding the M Society announcing that those who were members could now enjoy £5 off standard Madstock tickets. This discount would only be available for those not wanting to get into the much complained about golden circle.
Probably the most exciting news this week was the announcement that the band would be touring Australia for the first time since 1986. Four dates were announced for the month of September, which would see the band appear in Sydney, Merrimac, Ascot Vale and Claremont.
There were gaps between the various announced dates, so we urged Australian fans to keep their eyes peeled for a number of smaller gigs that may be announced as the tour go closer.
Box set news now, and we were informed that there would be a slight delay with the release, and that all being well the sets would start to be dispatched from the 2nd of March onwards. Unfortunately, a few days later we had to issue a special edition of the MIS as it was revealed that Trinity Street, the company behind the box set, had gone into administration.
Madness’ management proved to be really on the ball, releasing their own press statement, which finished with;
“Please rest assured that our primary concern right now is you the fan… making sure your orders are dealt with.
We really appreciate your patience in this difficult time. More news to follow soon.”
For those of us who had parted with our hard earned cash, this was now time to cross those fingers!
On a brighter note, we were able to reveal (thanks to Dicka) the full tracklisting for the box set. Now, we just had to hope that we’d actually receive our copies.
Dance Brigade news now, and the band this week announced that the forthcoming album of theirs was back on track and due to be finished in the next couple of months. They were also working on putting up a few tracks to their MySpace page, which they were declaring was a gift to the fans for being so patient.
Elsewhere in this issue Jonathan Young reported that Mike Barson would be the next member of Madness, following Suggs and Lee, to appear on an Audio Bullys track. The track called “Twist me Up” would feature Mike on piano and Suggs on backing vocals.
On to Blockheads news, and we, courtesy of BritFilms.tv, were able to announce that it was looking like actor Andy Serkis would be appearing in a new Ian Dury biopic as the man himself. According to Serkis filming would begin in April.
It was over to North London band MOT next as Jonathan Young reviewed their recent gig at The Dublin Castle, where the band were booked in for a residency. A number of new tracks were aired during the evening with “Nobody Knows” and “Another Day” being Jon’s favourites.
Jon finished off by saying;
“Alongside classics like Uptown Miser, Faces, I must be paranoid, Can’t take anymore, their own Sign of the Times, and newer tracks, Spinning Around, Going Crazy and Staring into space, it was a foot stomping, pogo jumping, dance along fun evening in the DC’s back room, showing old fans and new comers alike why they are the new kings of the castle on a Camden Saturday night.”
We brought this issue to a close by revealing that the French MIS team and Big 8 Records would be announcing the final track list for their Madness tribute album on the 27th of the month.
15 years ago…
Issue 249 – Sunday 15th February to Saturday 21st February 2004
It never ceases to amaze us where some of the Madness rumours start, and this issue was a prime example, as it was there that we learned, from the ‘Salvage Squad’ web site no less, that the ‘Our House’ musical would be going on a full UK tour from this coming July.
On the Madness website message board the fans were unsure as to whether the musical would tour or not. Was the information from ‘Salvage Squad’ reliable? We’d just have to wait and see.
Always one to rummage through the vast depths of the Amazon web site, Jonathan Young had un-earthed a new music DVD that had only recently been released. Entitled “80’s DVD Jukebox”, the disc featured over 80 minutes of live television performances with such bands as Duran Duran, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Madness, and many more.
Continuing his ‘Tour Madness’ sneak preview was one Jermaine, who treated us to his fourth and final part of his latest Tour Madness update, which featured complete track listings and detailed lowdowns of the recent Christmas tour. This week we featured The Brighton Conference Centre (December 16th 2003), Cardiff International Arena (December 18th), and Birmingham (December 19th – venue not listed).
We finished this week’s issue off with an update (courtesy of Chris Carter-Pegg) on the current situation with regards to the Camden Tube redevelopment public enquiry.
Under the proposed scheme we would not only lose the tube station as we knew t (the location for parts of ‘One Better Day’, ‘Camden Town’ and various other bits of footage. We would also lose the HSBC building (back drop for the Embarrassment intro), Camden Market and most tragically, the Electric Ballroom, Holts shoe shop and the shop formerly known as Rock On. All of these famous locations faced compulsory purchase and demolition under Transport and Works Act powers, unless the scheme could be rejected.
Rob Hazelby
Sign of the Times
Man City apologise to Chelsea for playing iconic Madness song after 6-0 thrashing.
Manchester City appeared to be rubbing it into Chelsea as they played Madness track ‘One Step Beyond’ after hammering the Blues 6-0 at the Etihad on Sunday. The ska song is a Stamford Bridge anthem that Chelsea play after big victories and it seemed to be a deliberate choice to wind up the beaten Londoners.
However, City officials made sure the song was stopped and issued an apology to the travelling fans, according to the Daily Mail.
Madness have a long association with Chelsea thanks to singer Graham ‘Suggs’ McPherson and drummer Dan ‘Woody’ Woodgate being fans of the club.
Time
That’s just about it for this week’s edition of the MIS.
We’ll be back next Sunday where hopefully we’ll have more to report on.
