Madness Information Service Online Newsletter #734 -Wedding Special – Sunday 2nd June to Saturday 8th June 2013
Hello and a very warm welcome to this bank holiday edition of the weekly MIS Online newsletter.
You can’t really know, when you start a band, the myriad ways in which the art that you create will be appreciated and weave its way through so many lives. The greatest by-product of wanting to hang with mates and make music is that Madness then became a shared interest that unites many people. Beautiful friendships are formed in the circles of appreciation for their sound that ripple ever onwards. This is none more evident than in our own back yard this weekend, as we happily pronounce a wedding within the very pages of MIS. Robert and Liz made their promises to each other at a hotel in Bristol on Friday.
“Congratulations to our friends Robert Hazelby and Liz Maher on getting married yesterday – it must be love! Nice touch to name the tables after Madness songs.”
Julia Bardodej.
So I’d like all readers to raise a glass of whatever you have handy and toast the happy couple wishing them a long playing and happy existence that stands the test of time like that of all our favourite songs. Fovever more and nothing less.
With that in mind, let the band news continue onwards, who knows who will unite after the music next, here is the latest goings on, Catch!…
Enjoy the read.
Simon Roberts, Jon Young, Liz Hazelby, Rob Hazelby
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
June 9th Rockness, Iverness, Scotland
June 12th Armada Festival, France
June 14th Chepstow Race course, UK
June 15th Newark Festival, UK
June 28th Newcastle Race course, UK
June 29th Daytripper, Waterford, Ireland
July 6th Carlise Racecourse, Carlisle, UK
July 7th Nuits De Fourviere Festival, Lyon, France
July 8th Les Deferlantes, d’Argeles Sur Mer, France
July 10th Jazz Montauban Festival, France
July 11th Festival De Poupet, France
July 12th Henley Festival, Henley On Thames, UK
July 17th Sandown Park Racecourse, UK
July 19th Newmarket Racecourse, UK
July 20th Haydock Park Racecourse, UK
August 10th Fete Du Bruit, Landerneau, France
August 11th Brussels Summer Fest, Belgium
September 16th L’Olympia, Paris, France
September 22nd Northants CCC, UK
September 28th Alexandra Palace, London, UK
October 12th Esprit Arena, Duesseldorf, Germany
November 22nd-25th House Of Fun Weekender, Minehead, UK
For tickets see links via: www.madness.co.uk
Suggs Live
June 5th Chatham Central Theatre
For Tickets: http://www.suggslive.com/
The Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra
July 6th, Godiva Festival, Coventry
July 20th Brockwell Park (Further info TBC)
August 11th United Colours Festival, Sheffield
August 16th Belgium (Brussels Summer Fest)
See ticket links via: www.ltso.mis-online.net
The Near Jazz Experience
June 4th – Indo 133 Whitechapel Rd, London E1 1DT *Free*
https://www.facebook.com/NearJazzExperience
BUY IT
The latest Madness and related items to buy.
NEW Limited Edition Colour Vinyl Reissue Albums.
1000 pressings of One Step Beyond (White) Absolutely, Complete Madness, Presents Rise and Fall (Transparent Red) 7 (Yellow) Keep Moving (Blue) 180 GRAM heavy Vinyl. Out June 10th.
http://madness.mamstore.co.uk/
Fu Man Chu Single
Priced at a mere 69p!
http://amzn.to/18q7Je4
Oui Oui Si Si Ja Ja Da Da Special Edition: 70 Track CD/DVD 4 Disc
www.madness.co.uk
Benevolence Of Sister Mary Ignatius – The Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra.
Out tomorrow, 3rd June
http://amzn.to/12z3nyH (CD link)
Also, newly available MP3 download *Out now. *
http://tinyurl.com/buxnxuy
Preview the full album on Spotify https://play.spotify.com/album/3B82H8BDOZu07kpxxRtmku
Pre Order: Suggs That Close My Story Book.
Out October 24th
http://amzn.to/14YOKsT
The next Madness single to be mentioned in Buy It. Misery? Tony Stratton has been in touch to say that radio schedules have mentioned the track for “sometime in July” watch this space for any further info on this forthcoming summer release.
While the Magic Brothers Single. Will be “You Don’t Have To Hide Your Love Away” out in August. The Magic line Album will follow in September.
SIGN OF THE TIMES
Below is a selection of interviews, articles and other items of recent news that have caught our eye over the course of the past week. Click on the links to be taken to the relevant page
Suggs – Life of Madness – Wigan Today.
http://www.wigantoday.net/news/the-interview-suggs-tells-all-about-life-of-madness-1-5724585
“I just didn’t know my dad. It wasn’t like he was some guy that was my Dad and he walked off. I had no vision of this bloke, he was just a figment of my imagination. Fortunately I found some photos of him, my aunt had some photos which was nice.”
Two years on from Mamba’s sudden death, the couple are actually about to get a new cat. Suggs grins: “We couldn’t even talk about it for two years. But my mate who lives up the road, his cat has just had 11 kittens – and of course, he just showed us some photos on his phone – and Ann was gone within 30 seconds.”
Mark Bedford’s Clear Spot
Mark presented ‘Clear Spot’ @ ResonanceFM with Terry Edwards, Simon Charterton and special guest, Chaz Jankel. Asking the question, ‘Why are we musicians?’ Hoping for more than, ‘I dunno? Hear the hour long indepth chat about why they started playing here…
https://soundcloud.com/resonance-fm/20-00-00-clear-spot-256kbps-46
Wilko Johnson – Radio 4 Mastertapes
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/radio4/posts/Wilko-JohsonArticle
“Although Wilko has said that he does not want to tour any more, he has been working on a studio album to be released later this year.”
Sunday Express – Album Review. Benevolence Of Sister Mary Ignatius
***** “… It’s a collection that crackles with great playing and oodles of good humour. Including Ali Baba (that starts with a manly heigh-ho), an arrangement of Mission: Impossible that Isaac Hayes would have been proud of, and Napoleon Solo, on which diverse instruments interlock with irresistible precision.”
The sun also reviewed Fu Man Chu, citing it’s woozy vocals as a high point.
Magic Brothers Radio interview
Tony Stratton interview Woody this week on BHR1287 radio about his forthcoming album with his Brother. The interview will be available on mixcloud shortly.
https://www.facebook.com/BHR1287
TWEETS OF A DOVE
Snippets from Twitter or the Madness Message Board that have caught our eye…
Madness announced on Facebook, about The House of Fun Weekender…
“The Fancy Dress theme this year has just been announced, it’s… Song Titles. Keep an eye on the House Of Fun page for tips, ideas and more news soon!”
Lee Thompson On Janice Long Radio 2 Tonight
Radio 2 was retweeted by Lee Thompson Ska. He will be on the show Midnight Sunday into early Monday June 3rd the day to talk about the album release. If you cant stay up or get up it will be on i player later.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b020sndj
Mark Bedford replied to a question about Prince Fatty Producing the Ska Orchestra LP.
“Yeah, it was great to go down to his studio in Brighton. It’s recorded pretty much live – in the old style.”
I REMEMBER WAY BACK WHEN
This week, MIS co-editor Rob Hazelby, goes back 5 years to issue 473, and the week of Sunday 1st June to Saturday 7th June 2008, and then back 10 years to issue 212 and the week of Sunday 1st June to Saturday 7th June 2003.
5 years ago…
Issue 474 – Sunday 1st June to Saturday 7th June 2008
With the Our House Musical being re-born since its original run at the Cambridge Theatre, subscriber Dicka was kind enough to pop along to the third preview performance and give readers a detailed lowdown on what he thought.
Dicka finished his review by commenting;
“I left the theatre a very happy person with the show being pretty much on par with the original. I missed the likes of Prospects and whilst meeting the cast backstage I mentioned that I thought it should be included again to the Company Manager Maria Gibbons, but the inclusion of NW5 is a great change and overall the changes make it a great reason for people who saw the original to catch the new version.”
Moving on, and it was over to Jonathan Young, who, after receiving a last-minute tip off detailing where the next Lee Thompson gig was due to take place journeyed off down the M1 to a pub in Finchley, called The Wishing Well.
“I arrive to see not only a chalk board sign with “LEE THOMPSON OF MADNESS With his band DAMAGED GOODS drawn upon it, but Kevin Burdett and Lee Thompson stood next to it entering the venue. It’s these little signs that make you realise you haven’t come to the wrong place.”
With two lengthy sets, and a great selection of tracks a good time was had by all.
We continued the Lost Goods coverage further on in the issue, with yet another review from Jonathan Young – a different gig, I might add! This time the assembled crowd are treated to two sets and a whopping 7 track encore, climaxing in the legendary Baggy Trousers.
New album rumours were the order of the next, as we re-printed what Spanish web site festivaleros.es were claiming to be the tracklisting for the forthcoming Liberty of Norton Folgate album.
The tracks listed were as follows;
Africa
Bingo
Dust Devil
Forever Young
The Hunchback of Torriano
Idiot Child
Let’s Go
The Liberty of Norton Folgate
NW5
Sugar & Spice
As the tracks had already been mentioned in various online articles we were of the opinion that the author had simple trawled the net and compiled his or her own list. Only time would tell!
On to the Madchart, and with less than a month to go before this year’s deadline organizer Paul Muscat felt it was time to give the MIS readership a gentle reminder to get those votes in.
Thanks for the stat-compiling efforts of Chris Carter-Pegg there were a massive 174 songs eligible for voting. Time to get those skates on!
We brought this issue of the MIS to a close with a wonderful competition organized by the one and only Dicka. After having bagged a fully-signed Our House Musical poster he was offering you the chance to win it. What do you have to do? Simply tell him where your house was, so he could send it out. Simple.
10 years ago…
Issue 212 – Sunday 1st June to Saturday 7th June 2003.
Following a flurry of news over the previous few weeks, and resulting packed MIS’, issue 212 was almost in wafer form compared to recent editions.
Despite warnings from Chris Carter-Pegg in the previous MIS informing us that the Madness gold disc on Ebay was not an official release, it would seem that some people just wouldn’t listen.
By the time of the auction close, the disc went for 350UKP!! As Chris rightly said at the time, “Madness”, and we couldn’t have agreed more.
Those of you who fancied getting yourselves some new clothes in time for the summer were well catered for, as this week Warrior Clothing announced they were running a happy hour. The scheme worked whereby any purchase made between 7:00pm and 8:00pm every day would see your order packed in with all manner of free goodies.
One of the more amusing things to land this week was Lee Thompson’s banishment from the official Madness message board. After telling one fan to fork off, he suddenly found himself unable to post any further messages to the site.
Following uproar from the fanbase, and a week where he couldn’t post anything at all, Chissy Boy relented, and returned his posting abilities.
With news being thin on the ground this week, we took a look at forthcoming gigs for One Step Behind, 1st Step Below and Badness, before finishing the issue with an Ebay lowdown, highlighting some of the more unusual items currently on sale there.
Rob Hazelby
MIS FEATURE
The Launch Party Of Sister Mary Ignatius @ The Dublin Castle
The album has started to ship. Finally for the first time since 1990 (baring reissues) a Lee Thompson Solo album is on sale to the general public as you read this. It’s already been described by one fan as “The Dog’s Cock” which we are pretty sure is a compliment.
The album features a great single…
Behind the scene’s – Fu Man Chu Video shoot.
Some great Lee Vocal Tracks…
Ali baba – Dublin Castle Soundcheck
And now lives in all the right places…
The album is installed in The Dublin Castle Jukebox
The Dublin Castle was the last stop on the May Tour.
Carrying on from our mentions of Bristol & “Later”, the band headed north to Manchester. In an old carpeted theatre hall with overlooking balcony they took to the stage at The Band on the Wall for a fine run through of the album and more, Lee resplendent in a hat baring a poppy motif in respect of the recent incident involving a solider that was reported in all the uk papers. Eastern Standard Time and a few other tracks particularly flew that night, while Seamus and Terry Edwards were not present (Steve F on organ taking his nods from Louis) the band still garnered cheers aplenty from a sizeable crowd for the venue size. Not quite packed but nicely full, as the feet danced upon the flooring that depicted amp plugs enlarged. Below the neon sign the band grooved on. Mission Impossible failed due to an effects pedal, the sound fell off a cliff into the abyss, but “we just made a feature of it” said Louis the next day with a shrug. It didn’t stop them rising again, Broadway Jungle certainly heated the room like napalm and by the end of the encore there were cheers for more. Then a DJ took over. One lone fan seemed to not get into the ska groove reporting later on a forum that it was a rip off for the money and the band a poor support for the DJ tunes. Yes a support band might have taken the edge of this fact at £20, but most reports are finely positive for the bands North West debut and I thank all the fans that made it a great night, it was so nice to see the band go well in a location less regular to Madness let alone a solo effort. Well done for supporting the music.
Fans then gathered afterwards alongside the band as we took over the TV to watch back Fridays extended Later with Jools Holland including more Bangarang and Lee’s interview. He was cheering and shhhing the attended crowd to hear the piece. “Yeah that’ll do.” He said satisfactorily afterwards, as fans passed around T-shirts for the band to sign, and the drinking and the stories got larger and larger into the night.
Bangarang on Later with Jools
Newcastle and a brick garage on an industrial estate was the setting of Saturdays gig. A dump that looked better once properly lit with external heaters indoors. The continuing mission to give away fake Lee £50 notes from the first aborted video shoot, and pin “Fordie” badges on every passing fan continued in earnest. Some young kids “too spicy” started the night, and then Ashington favourites “Shut Up” delighted with their own tunes and a few Bad Manners and Specials covers, straying respectfully no nearer Madness than songs they once covered like Shame and Scandal and Swan Lake.
For me having reviewed them before, the song that went down best to me, like a fine um bungo, was new track The Chase. Lying on the floor spitting the lyrics from under his Julliet bravo policewoman’s hat, it sounded like something fresh from Garry’s band that I might grow to enjoy further in the future. Though they disappointed by dropping Just Desserts my favourite of their past songs. They deserve credit for bringing in the most people to the gig I think. Given the poor turn out to this compared the boss sounds festival when LTSO were flocked to in Newcastle which is a real hotbed of nutty fandom. A free festival in Quayside was being blamed for sucking away a lot of party people on the night. Not quite the glorious gig you would hope for the band after hitting TV millions the night before. But an appreciative crowd none the less.
Though I was most surprised by a stationary punter or two in the front 2 rows, to the point I thought a statue had been built there. Ska is built to move your feet surely? and that’s what the majority of feet were doing most of the night across the room. Except when (despite wife Debbies off stage pleading) Lee told The Bruce Lee joke again. Everyone stood motionless for that punch line!
THE LAUNCH OF SISTER MARY
The two sets at the Dublin Castle though. Were something else. Music of the gods so amazing they turned a damp Tuesday into a Saturday night worthy of a week to recover from it. If Madness are the kings of pop sing-a-longs, then TLTSO are the masters of the perpetual groove, firm and spiraling like ear heroin with breakout solos that take you on a magnificent ride transporting you from wherever you were in life, to a happy bobbing land where your cares have been thrown out with yesterday chip papers.
The reinstalled Terry Edwards played a sax solo so impressive, the crowd and then the band clapped midsong to acknowledge how dam fine it sounded. Thommo turning and asking “Terry can I borrow your lungs?”
Bitty’s three guest appearances through the night in both set’s lifted the room further. Both set’s he featured on Fu ManChu and Bangarang. And also rejoined for Midnight Rider the 2nd time. The feeling that the first set with the press inside the DC had gone well set the mood for a great night. DJ Darren Bennet had started the mood well, and Spider carried it on in between the sets. Returning to the stage with everyone already happy but by now slightly more lubricated made for the most carefree playing ever achieved, everything that needed to be proved having already been set in part one, so that party two just effortlessly ascended from the speakers.
Fu Man Chu Soundcheck
Fu Man Chu 1st Set
The set list was:
Guns Fever, Sit and Wonder, Hot Reggae , Ali Baba , Heatwave ,Fu Manchu , Bangarang , Eastern Standard Time , Mission Impossible , Soon You’ll Be Gone , Broadway Jungle , Midnight Rider and Hello Josephine.
With Four winds being added as an encore. As well as Soul Serenade and Napoleon Solo being added to the second set.
‘It was defo the best one i have seen them do and got to see them twice in one night and then also dancing and singing along to the cd in the pub after too”
Lynn Lawlor
Seen at the Launch Party was Boz Boorer. The next man to join in live The Ska Orchestra adventures. He’ll be playing in July when Kev is on Madness Duty for the day.
An emotional chorus of all the brass players joining in to sing “Soon You’ll Be Gone” while pointing at drummer Roo. Marked huge respect to Rooney for helping the band get this far, and a fitting gig IF its the last time we see him play as he moves off to new shores. Thommo was mock crying the whole song, in tribute, and Fordie sang “Soong Roo’ll be gone.
Broadway Jungle & Midnight Rider Set 1
The album is out now. Buy it. Join the party, for Sister Mary is launched and the Mission has been a fine plan well executed. More gigs this Summer.
Jonathan Young
CHARTS
After a period with absolutely no chart action to report as Complete and Total Madness and Oui Oui Si Si Ja Ja Da Da took their leave of the charts, Madness are slowly clawing their way back. As has often been the case it has been Complete Madness leading the way. Last week it re-entered the top 200 albums chart after an absence of seven weeks at number 137. It was also at number 30 in the indie chart. This week it rises to number 29 on the indie chart.
Whilst Complete Madness was missing from the top 200 it was left to Oui Oui to lead the way. In the weeks since I last wrote it dropped from number 64 to 125, then to 151 before dropping out of the top 200. It’ll be interesting to see whether the summer tour dates, which were billed as the Oui Oui Si Si Ja Ja Da Da Tour, provide yet another boost for the album. For the last 3 weeks the album has not even been in the indie top 50.
Thus far the album has spent 26 weeks in the top 200, 18 of them were in the top 100 and 12 of them were in the top 75, meaning the album compares well with anything Madness have released since and including Keep Moving.
The next fortnight sees a busy release schedule for Madness related product, which may or may not make some dent on the charts. First up sees the Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra release their debut album on Axe Attack. A fine appearance on Later With Jools Holland a couple of weeks ago will have done much to persuade punters to pre-order the CD from Amazon (or Sainsbury’s in my case as it was cheaper) and it currently sits at number 112 on iTunes on its first day available as a download. A promising start. Amazon also list it in their top 100, whilst it is number one in their reggae chart and their ska chart. If you’re going to buy The Benevolence Of Sister Mary Ignatius and you’re a chart fan make sure you buy it by Saturday!
After that comes a vinyl reissue of Madness’ Stiff Records albums. For some reason they are coming out on coloured vinyl. Perhaps there’s a reason why each album has the colour chosen for it, but other than Keep Moving being blue in honour of Turning Blue I can’t spot it.
The albums are available to pre-order from the Madshop (or is it Madstore? (which can be accessed from the main Madness website)), but there’s mistakes in the listings that mean I’ll not be ordering just yet if at all. The studio albums are single disc jobbies, but Complete Madness is a double and is more expensive. At the moment the details and price for Absolutely are those that belong to Complete Madness, so be prepared to overpay if the error is not corrected tomorrow.
Also remember to get your chart info from me as the data given in these listings is woefully out of date. They last looked at my stats for Complete Madness in 2009 when it had only spent 99 weeks in the charts…
Whether these releases will impact on any charts will be interesting. In my opinion they’d have been better off releasing these titles for Record Store Day. So they are ten months early or two months late depending on how you view your glass.
Right that’s it for me. I’m off to bed early so if the postman wakes me tomorrow by delivering my Sister Mary Ignatius CD I won’t be in too much of a bad mood…
Paul Rodgers
TIME…
We leave you with two fun phone videos, shot by Woody when the band were rehearsing for The Olympics closing Ceremony.
Thanks for reading, we’ll be back next week. Ta ta for now.
Liz Hazelby, Rob Hazelby, Simon Roberts, Jon Young
(With thanks to Paul Rodgers & Tony Stratton)
The Author
