As January draws to a close it’s great to see that summer gigs are continuing to be added to the band’s 2019 line up.
This week, Madness announced the return of the House of Common event which takes place on the August bank holiday Monday; 26th. Pre sale tickets are available from 30th January.
If you’re not already registered to take advantage of the pre sale ticket scheme you just need to go to www.madness.co.uk.
Meanwhile, a newly announced XL North London homecoming summer gig has been promoted for the 15th June. This gig sees Madness backed by a full scale orchestra at Kenwood House Camden borough.
As with the House of Common gig, ensure you’re registered on the Madness web site,
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.
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: 768 – Sunday 26th January to Saturday 1st February 2014
We began this week’s MIS with news that was sure to interest subscribers with iPhones, iPads or the iPod Touch. Why? Well, thanks to many, many hours of effort from MIS web site designer and maintainer Simon Roberts we were pleased to announce the release of the Madness Information Service app.
Synching with the MIS web site the app pulled in the following:
Latest issues of the weekly MIS bulletins
Latest gig and ticket information
Music and videos
Links to Madness related web sites, Twitter feeds and Facebook
How much would this set you back? Absolutely nothing. Not one penny. It’s absolutely 100% free!
New gig announcements were slim this week, with only one addition, which listed the Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra booked to perform at the legendary Dingwalls on Thursday 13th March.
Over in Specialized 3 news, the big news was that work was now underway to produce a 2015 calendar. In order to make this happen, your help was needed. You could either make a monetary donation or send in a passport style photo which would be used to form a mosaic style picture similar to that found on the One Step Beyond album sleeve.
One to beer news (!) and we reported that the Madness ale “Gladness” would be coming to a supermarket new you soon as Tesco had begun stocking it, albeit in a limited number of outlets which we listed.
We brought this issue to a close by reminding you to download the new MIS Online app and to let us have your feedback – good or bad.
10 years ago…
Issue 508 – Sunday 25th January to Saturday 31st January 2009
Wednesday evenings had been awfully quiet for the past few months, and it’d been like that ever since Madness fan Adam Nicholls lost his iTunes library.
Quite what he was doing to lose all that we didn’t know. The important thing was that his precious music library had been restored, which meant that Nutty Radio was back, and for the last couple of Wednesday’s had been running from 9pm ’til around 11pm.
On to ticket news, and the big announcement this week was that golden circle tickets had gone on sale for those willing to purchase their Madstock 5 tickets in advance. Little did fans realise until the day that this golden circle would segregate fans, meaning those without one of these special passes would have to stand miles back from the stage to see their favourite band.
More gig news now, and although not yet confirmed there were rumours doing the rounds indicating that the band had been booked for the following events:
May 31st, Pinkpop, Holland
June 5th to 7th, Ring and Park Festival, Nurburgring, Germany
July 4th, Heineken Opener Festival, Poland
July 5th, Roskilde, Denmark
July 10th, Hultsfred, Sweden
July 12th, Exit Festival, Serbia
The band would be in for one packed couple of months if the above became officially confirmed!
Remember Chris’ cupboard? With it being absent from the official site during the revamp, it seemed to many that it was no more. Thankfully the Madness Central team had been kind enough to give Chris and his cupboard a temporary home on their web forum and you were all encouraged to sign up and send in your questions. Well, what were you waiting for?
Madness playing Glastonbury? Yes, this had become a yearly rumour so why should this year be any different? You’d have to blame this latest rumour on the fact that promotional articles at the Midem Trade Show were stating that Madness would be appearing on Sunday 28th June, the same day as blur were due to headline the Pyramid stage.
With the rumours also starting to filter on to the eFestivals forums you had to wonder if that this could be more than mere whispers. We’d have to wait and see.
Book news now, and an early press release in from Wavelength Films announced that Suggs would be releasing a book based around his recent TV series, Disappearing London. Priced at £18.99 for hardback and £12.99 for paperback, the book had a release date of August 20th. Time to get saving.
15 years ago…
Issue 246 – Sunday 25th January to Saturday 31st January 2004
We started this issue by putting the fears of a number of MIS subscribers to rest. We weren’t quite sure what they were doing, but for some reason the flash animation seen by the majority of visitors to the official web site wasn’t appearing, and all they were getting was a red screen. Thinking that something was up with the site they contacted us in the hope we could clear things up. Unfortunately all we could suggest was that they upgrade to the latest version of Flash and ensure they didn’t have a pop-up blocker running. Yep. We were useless!
With the December tour now long gone, Jermaine of Tour Madness was now busy adding the latest batch of entries to his fantastic publication.
Jermaine kindly gave us a sneak preview by giving us access to some of the new material which would eventually be finding its way into the next edition of his tour bible.
Moving on, and co-editor Jonathan, gave us a heads-up on the latest Dave Gorman news.
MIS Online had known about Dave Gorman sharing our great taste in music ever since we interviewed him about his comedy show “Reasons to be Cheerful” way back in MIS issue 120.
Dave is a comedian, bestselling author and maybe one day he’ll be a novelist. At some point, probably during 2003 he reminded listeners of Northern Ireland’s Radio 1 Evening Session, how great Madness were when he chose Baggy Trousers as his favourite track of all time.
Dave On the subject of Baggy Trousers :-
“Favourite track of all time, the track that made me love music, up until then I’d only liked music. I still see the video now all those kids piling out of school, the most exciting thing ever to a 9 year old me and it still gets my heart racing even now.”
One `lost` song that kept getting a mention every year or so on the various Madness forums was `Perfect Place`, a fantastic track that unfortunately never received an official release. For those who had never heard it, the Madness Trading Ring had uploaded a live recording (taken from The Red Wedge Tour, Jan 27th 1986, and featured on the bootleg “Nutty Sounds 2”) of the track for fans to download and listen to. Little did we know that we’d have to wait a few more years to get our hands on the studio (demo) version.
Rob Hazelby
Sign of the Times
Mr Scurf Chats With Chrissy Boy
Mr Scurf has a chat with Chrissy Boy in the year of Madness XL.
This includes an exclusive chat about a forthcoming Madness book for the 40th year.; the band from Childhood to 1979.
We love a pun at MIS, so this OMP on the poster for Kenwood House tickles us in it’s OMD reference. So we can forgive the truth that the Kenwood concert is in the estate of a stately home on the corner of Hampstead Heath and therefore “Park” is stretching it a bit! Ha ha.
Next to this amusing riffing on an epic poster of the band in CTUN evening wear whilst being conducted, are the other words that don’t make us laugh but make us broadly smile. The words…
FULL SCALE ORCHESTRA
Oh joy. I’ve dreamed of this day.
Return to Camden…
We found out about this massive North London gig a short while back and knew that for The Summer, this was going to be something of Camden XLence. This is probably the biggest ever Camden Borough Madness gig. Nearer to say the D.C. than north London’s Finsbury Park and actually in the NW5 postcode where a few of the Kentish Town boys grew up. Very close to Parliament Hill where the young gang used to run around setting fire to bins! Nothing else in this XLciting year (with more announcements to come as these are described as the first) will touch as closely to Madness’ teenage years geographically and show how far they have come in 40 years to be seen as a band playing this toff house with a dramatic backing of classical players enhancing some of the tunes that has carried them on this four decade journey. Epic, fitting. Well done on a great Idea.
This is the first full Madness Camden Borough gig since the 2012 Launch of Oui Oui at The roundhouse and the first Madness gig in Camden for Mike since the bus roof of Inverness street market in 2009. (First in Kentish Town post code since 2010 Flower pot pub Ben Sherman Launch)
Full Scale Speculation.
We know the orchestra will be in good hands. We suspect Mike Kearsey who has in the past worked with the orchestra pit theatre set up during the Hackney Folgate film gigs would be in the frame to make this special in orchestration. Mike and Bedders on hand would be my dream ticket for wider integration of the madness sound.
It must be love, surely among contenders for a song they would enhance. Even if they are probably deciding that not ever song on the night practically could benefit from the extra players. I’m salivating for the prospect of NW5 with woodwind, enlarged string section and more, to be heard in the very district Bobby Townsend (the songs lost soul) grew up in alongside the bands own humble beginning.
So who are the orchestra? They haven’t been named. Vicki Lee amusingly suggested the Kenneth woods symphony orchestra as ken relevant! But surely fingers point more towards the direction of players from the royal philharmonic concert orchestra who are set to perform the next day with Jose Carreras and have a history with adapting to pop acts not just opera and classical events.
So Would you put a tenor on it? The fact that Madness haven’t yet splashed The Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra on the poster, suggests that work is ongoing to decide which instruments are suitable for which songs that night to be enhanced rather than lean on a named orchestra.
The RPCO has first and second violins, Violas, Cellos and double basses in its string section and even a Harp. Flutes, Piccolos, Oboes, Clarinets (including bass), bassoons and contrabassoons in its woodwind. It’s brass section boasts Tuba, trombones, trumpets, French horns and a cor anglais. Precussion with Timpani. Up to 70 players.
Now it’s massively overkill to expect all that lot on every Madness tune. What is needed, (Remembering that the 10 Live Madness players already cover Vocals, Piano, bass, Guitar, saxophone, drums, percussion, trombone, trumpet and baritone sax.) is a select ensemble picked from that wider range that adds the players needed for each conceptualised rendition of each chosen Madness song. It’s enhancement over just overpowering unthought through pomp. Done well, could be amazing and so I’m going to hope and beg loudly now for a live album, USB or DVD.
Look at Monty Python’s Life of Brian Oratorio called “Not the messiah” or look at Bill Baileys “Guide to the orchestra” massive white shirt and black tie events can be funny too! Orchestra’s are ripe for a comedy twist too. This is the band that once kazzoed a Prince, they invented the cheeky nod during formal ocassions.
I want to hear the intro from Also Sprach Zarathustra ( if you just said huh? 2001 a space odyssey ok) mashed up into the first notes of night boat. Have fun with it. Madness with a full scale chosen set of orchestrated instruments should be both touchingly sweet and a big sound and jokingly undercutting of the grandeur of the sound, just like Those old Nutty pop videos.
We guess the royal philharmonic’s 89 year old conductor André Previn won’t be available to come along and say that Madness are playing all the right notes, just not necessarily in the right order.
Either way what ever manoeuvres take place. We will see you in the park. ( And after drinks. Sunday 16th MIS Presents some classical music, ska, plenty of Madness tunes and more at The Dublin Castle. Join us for Camden Four Oh.)
Classical Orchestrated Madness.
Welcome to The House Of Ken.
Jonathan Young
Time
Wouldn’t it be good for the 40th year of 2tone, if the House Of Common “Special” guests included other artists from that label and era of four decades past? Fans are already speculating.
Rumour mill suggests letters and phone calls and offers have been made and efforts to bring some of these people together are on the cards. Not just for this event or announced events. Could any of Madness pop up at other band’s events in return? It’s going to be a fun year finding out. We are in XLent times.
