We kick off this week’s issue with a reminder that at Dingwalls on Monday 1st October there will be a one-off, never to be repeated, gig from the Lee Thompson All Stars. At this event, our favourite saxophonist will be joined by a host of musicians to perform songs from across his lengthy career.
Following this, Lee will then host the screening of his film “One Man’s Madness”, followed by a question and answer session.
There will be both a matinee and an evening performance, screening plus Q&A.
MATINEE
Doors 1.30pm
Film 2.00pm – 3.20pm
3.30pm Q&A / Lee Thompson All Stars
EVENING
Doors 6.30pm
Film 7.10 – 8:30pm
8:40 Q&A / Lee Thompson All Stars
Note that this will be an advance screening, so please be aware the film may differ slightly from the finished release.
For more information on ‘One Man’s Madness’ and to order exclusive products, and book tickets via pledge here: http://smarturl.it/LeeThompson
Also currently available from Lee Thompson’s pledge campaign are some extremely unique chances to own some handwritten lyrics from the pen of Lee Thompson.
The five copies of the “Embarrassment” lyrics penned by the song writer’s own hand have already sold out. Congratulations to all who’ve purchased/pledged on this. It’s a great item that would look amazing framed. Meanwhile, The Prince has just one from the original five remaining.
Expect a few other Lee Thompson songs to get a similar treatment, but note that when a particular song is gone, that tune is unlikely to ever be presented for sale ever again.
In some 40 years of Madness music we’ve only ever known “Our House” to come up for public sale/auction in this form before, and that was written on a door!!!
This has pushed the Pledge campaign to half completed ahead of a current deadline extension of November 17th. And a December 1st release date for the film.
Any delay in reaching the target may push this further into 2018. So, if you have already pledged or are about to, also spread the word and the link this as far as your Mad circles reach.
We’ll see many of you on October 1st at Dingwalls, and will bring a full review of the film’s current “rough cut” from the screening.
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.
An advanced test screening version of the new Mockumentary comedy and life story film, hosted by Lee with A Q&A after the film and a special performance.
As we recently mentioned, Thommo’s film project “One Man’s Madness, A RockuMockuDocumentary”, is now live on Pledge Music
Lee Thompson’s comedy life story film, featuring multiple mad Lee performances, and starring all of Madness and many more well-known voices, is nearly complete and coming out this year. All that remains to make this possible if for you to pledge and help complete the project as planned.
Exclusive Baggy Trousers video prints now available.
Unearthed from the archives are four never before seen prints from the video shoot for the iconic Madness Baggy Trousers video, featuring Lee Thompson flying above the fields of Islip Street School.
Numbered and signed by Lee, these hand printed photographs are limited to a run of only 2…
This 40th anniversary edition of Ian Dury’s debut album, ‘New Boots And Panties!!’ comes as an Amazon Exclusive which includes the album on limited edition clear vinyl.
Ian Dury, like Ray Davies and Paul Weller was a very English talent. The colourful, metropolis inhabiting characters like Billericay Dickie or Plaistow Patricia he sung about and the ever so cockney music hall accent he chose to sing in were a big part of that. But most of all it was the detailed, poetic way he catalogued English life and the melting pot of musical styles used to do so, from punk to funk to jazz and rock ‘n’ roll, which left the listener in no doubt that Dury’s work could only come from one place: The very heart of England.
New Boots And Panties!! Was the debut album for Ian Dury, originally released on Stiff Records in 1977. It’s often cited as one of the first classic UK punk albums, the record covers a diverse range of musical styles reflecting Dury’s influences and background in pub rock, taking in funk, disco, British music hall and early rock and roll. It’s considered Dury’s best album and it was also his most successful after it was certified Platinum in the UK 2 years after its release. Packaged in a 12×12 hardcover book, this is the most comprehensive version of the album to date.
A 12×12 hardcover book containing 4CDs, the original album on vinyl, and a pull out 8 page booklet.
Sleeve notes by Comedian and close friend, Phill Jupitus. A regular guest on TV panel shows, radio broadcast, and currently touring a new stand-up show.
This package contains the hit singles Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, and Sweet Gene Vincent.
Alongside the original album there are 3 bonus discs containing Bonus Tracks, Demo Versions, John Peel Sessions and a full live performance not available before on CD.
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 698 – Sunday 23rd September – Saturday 29th September 2012
It’d been an exciting couple of days for us Madness fans, as one and a half minute preview clips of each track from the forthcoming Madness album had now surfaced on iTunes for our listening pleasure.
The album may not have been due out until 28th October, but these clips gave you an excellent opportunity to sample the album and get a taste for it prior to release.
Meanwhile, regular contributor Paul Rodgers had noticed that one or two articles that cover Cooking Vinyl’s involvement with that band had featured a mention of “a particularly exciting TV plot, due to unravel over the coming months”.
Naturally, we looking forward to finding out what TV appearance(s) might happen, beyond Jools Holland, which we already knew about at this point in time.
We kicked off there articles with details of the track samples available on iTunes, and reported that the vinyl edition appeared to be a single LP with 11 tracks, which came with a download link to get the 3 remaining bonus tracks that were due to appear on the CD. Otherwise it was the same as the CD release.
This week also saw mention of an special date as we reported that the Our House Musical would mark its 10th anniversary on Sunday 11th November 2012, with a West End gala concert at the Savoy Theatre in aid of Help for Heroes.
Tickets were now available, and you were encouraged to contact the box office directly if you wanted to purchase them.
Next, it was on to “Woodgate’s Small World”, as we took the first of our many looks at the new album. In this issue we started with Woodgate’s tunes, including two of the songs that were the most new to us fans, having not been heard in live concerts in the run up to this release.
The Woodgate Brothers previously wrote “No Money” on the Wonderful album, and we’d already mentioned when Kitchen Floor first was played live in 2010 how it began as a demo called I Got You, written by Nick and Dan, before it was overhauled by the Madness music machine, a song Woody had been quoted as saying it’s written about his cat.
We brought this issue to a close with the news that although EMI had finally been sold to Universal Music, the Virgin back catalogue wasn’t re-sold during this process. The assets of Mad not Mad, and probably The Madness were therefore entering their next stage of ownership under these deals, in terms of parent company.
Unfortunately it was still too early to say what effect this might have on the re-release of these albums in any future years.
10 years ago…
Issue number 438 – Sunday 23rd Sept to Saturday 29th Sept 2007
We kicked off this issue with the news that a three acoustic piano and vocal only session was aired on Saturday on BBC Radio Two, when Mike and Suggs were guests on Dermot O’Leary’s Saturday show. You could listen to the show on the BBC web site for the next 6 days, or simply download the audio stream Looby had made available for fans.
Alongside this we featured a full transcript of the interview.
Moving on….
This was it. The final Blackpool update before the following weekend’s nutty antics kicked off. Vince Carden was here with those last nuggets of information.
Revised earliest check in time was now 1 pm, and we were told to check in with Vince and not the hotel. Where would we find him? The bar, of course!
Next, we passed things over to Simon Walshe, who reported that he’d been listening to Radio 1 the other day, and Paolo Nutini covered “It Must Be Love”, which he commented was very, very good.
Elsewhere we had one final post pushing the forthcoming Madness Weekender in Blackpool, showing you what you’d be missing out on if you passed the weekend by. Whether this final plug encouraged a few last minute fans to jump on board isn’t known.
It was over to Jon Young next, who reported on Radio 1’s recent airing of Madness tracks. We had reports of Sarah Cox giving the band a good airing on her breakfast show, Chris Moyles playing House of Fun as part of the station’s 40 years of Radio 1 Celebrations.
Finally, on Wednesday’s “Radio one Legends” show, where a different celebrity DJ’s at 9pm each day, the guest presenter was Debbie Harry from Blondie. She was play songs that influenced her and some of the music she thinks has got what it takes today. She Played One Step beyond during her choices.
We brought this issue to a close with a heads-up to the readership, reminding them that as the entire MIS team would be going along to the Madness Weekender in Blackpool, expect the next issue to be rather slim, as there may be a few sore heads about.
With the opening of the ‘Our House’ musical just around the corner, the content of the issue was very much slanted towards that.
As it’d been a good five minutes since the last greatest hits album, the forthcoming musical must have seemed like a good opportunity to churn out yet another. Weighing in at around ten of your finest UK pounds, this latest re-release did at least feature two new songs – ‘Sara’s Song’, and ‘Simple Equation’. Even with these new additions you’d have to be a hardcore collector to consider forking out a tenner for two new tracks.
With a bit of digging around the ‘Our House’ musical web site, Jonathan had not only managed to find a full cast list, but a rundown of all the songs featured in the production. With ‘Sarah’s Song’ mysteriously absent from the list, we assumed that it had received a last minute name change.
For one reason or another, the launch of the musical wasn’t going quite according to plan, and the opening night was put back two days to Friday the 4th of October. Those who had tickets for the two missing dates were advised to call the box office for more information.
Problems were also rearing up over on the official Madness web site, as a number of subscribers were reporting that the page just wasn’t being displayed. In an effort to help get the problem rectified, we asked those encountering issues to drop us details of their computer set up. This information would then be passed on to Bedders, in the hope that armed with these details the problem could be swiftly ironed out.
This issue finished off with a final push for those wishing to attend the Madness musical meet, penned in for Monday 7th. This start of the working week date was chosen to coincide with the Suggs and Carl question and answer session due to take place that night.
Rob Hazelby
Live Intensified
Near Jazz Experience in Session
The NJE played a live set in the DJ’s (Gideon Coe) front room (or shed as the show is billed) ! on BBC 6 on Thursday evening.
They played Jimi Hendrix’s “Voodoo Chile”, their own tune which they decided on the night to call “double trouble” as Terry plays two saxes on it simultaneously & an old Duke Ellington song ‘Limbo jazz’.
Bedders spoke about being on Shipbuilding ahead of the session. all worth a listen! their LP is out now on Sartorial records entitled Afloat.
Afloat – NJE Reviewed by Dancing About Architecture
Even on paper, The NJE, standing for Near Jazz Experience, is a fascinating concept. Horn led, jazz infused, pop/rock instrumentals, largely unrehearsed and improvised but built on some solid yet supple underlying grooves. But jazz for the purist this isn’t, unless that particular purist also has a hankering for strange proto-Krautrock meets Motown grooves, skittering back beats and rock music on Avant gardening leave.
The album wanders between some big-beat, groovy floor fillers, albeit best-suited to a strange dance club where anything goes and minds are broad when it comes to the generic what is and what isn’t, and music which just seems to pull the floor away from under you. It inhabits the world of the freeform jam but just as easily snaps into a more focused, more song driven mind set and it’s highlights are just as likely to be found in long form rambles as they are in concise hook laden jazz-pop blasts.
This isn’t an album to approach like the usual collection of songs, although undoubtedly each song is a separate train of musical thought. It is at once a holistic album following a singular musical idea and a scattergun deliver of songs within songs, musical tangents and boundless experimentation. It is also one that whilst based in a loose jazz setting spills over into any number of other genres, re-appropriating the best ideas, forms and sounds and bending those into the Near Jazz Experience.
In short approach with caution, an open mind and willingness to have your generic preconceptions shattered…and then some.
Dave Franklin
Afloat – Review by the Evening Standard
Having managed to establish a cult following for their longstanding monthly residency in the East End, freethinking trio The NJE — short for near jazz experience — bring their fluid experimental stylings to CD.
Experience is paramount here: bassist Mark Bedford and drummer Simon Charterton are seasoned veterans of the UK’s pop and rock circuit, while multi-instrumentalist Terry Edwards has gigged with everyone from P J Harvey to St Vincent.
Edwards’s knack for playing alto and tenor sax simultaneously, à la the great Rahsaan Roland Kirk, brings a winding melodicism to tracks that evolved on the fly, unfettered by rehearsalsFeaturing an electronic intro from guest Alex “Hot Chip” Taylor and a surging take on Jimi Hendrix’s Voodoo Chile, the only cover, Afloat, is the sound of three musicians delighting in their synergy, and relishing the unknown
Jane Cornwell
Time
We’re almost at the end of this week’s issue.
Before we sign-off we urge you to pop over to the web page of the Lee Thompson “One Man’s Madness” Pledge campaign to check out the promotional video if you’ve not already done so. And while you’re there get pledging!
