our parents, often and mistakes, grace denton

Weirdly, just after I wrote on here that I wouldn't be making much work for the foreseeable future, I found out that something I wrote about eighteen months ago had just been published in the anthology about parents by Often and Mistakes. The anthology was compiled by Grace Denton and so much work and care has gone into it. You can purchase this digital anthology at a price of your choosing and the proceeds will all be donated to Simon on the Streets, a West Yorkshire homeless charity. So anyway, Grace does so many ace things I thought it would be good to list a few of them below. This is by no means everything, but some of the things I know about. Grace has been involved in, and initiated so many wonderful projects and she is also an incredible artist. The things she does are always made with great care and sensitivity. But as well as this, they are always worthwhile and positive.

Grace (left) & Rose (right) I don't know who took the photo, please tell me and I'll credit you

Often and Mistakes is Rose Robbins and Grace Denton, based in Bristol. They showcase new work by writers and artists through print publications and videos. We also run comic-drawing and animation workshops. 

Judy Works, again if you made this great logo, let me know and I'll credit you!

Judy Works is a girl gang, support network and commissioner set up by Grace, Camille Rearden and Rosa Martyn to support and represent the creative endeavours of people who are non-male identified. The rest of the world is set up to support men. Judy Works is redressing the balance.

Anna (left) & Grace 9right) photo by Tom Copps

The Middle Ones are a band who write and play wonderful songs. They formed in Norwhich and have done so many great and exciting things like touring all over and making records and playing music for plays and doing a year-long residency at Cafe Kino in Bristol. I swapped Anna a Middle Ones 10" for the Tiger + Panda 10" when we went to Norwich. It has my favourite song on it, 'young explorer'. For a while, The Middle Ones were the only band I made an effort to see.

Expensive photo by Tom Copps

Grace sings and plays in EXPENSIVE with Matthew Cheney and Pete Shadbolt, an electronic pop band of 'non-performers'. The songs are dreamy and danceable and remind me of the music of Arctic Circle, which is not surprising because they are/were another project of Matthew Cheney, all round good-guy.

As I said, there's loads more and I haven't really written very well but I just think Grace is a great artist and a positive force in the world.

tiger & panda & ox & otter live at cafe kino: press release

Polite Records are proud to present Tiger & Panda & Ox & Otter Live at Cafe Kino

cat no.: pcd016 
format: CDR/download
artwork: CDR with photographic print, lino printed title and 12 page mini-zine
price: £5 (CDR) £2 (download)

The night this record was made was something special. One of those times that you get so rarely in life when you can't think of anywhere you'd rather be or anything you'd rather be doing. The atmosphere in the basement of Cafe Kino was cosy and warm (thanks to the large crowd mostly -it had been freezing during setup), and it felt like the whole room was willing the performers to do well. 

Henry Ireland and Olly Watson have been my friends for a long time and I am extremely lucky that this is the case. From the outset of this record, you get a taste of what their music is about -at once intensely personally revealing and incredibly shy. The way Henry introduces the concept of the evening and then instantly rubbishes it reflects their style of serious ideas and high concepts refracted through a prism of “let's not take this too seriously, eh?”. Their music is always both serious, but in its own way, not some poe-faced reallyfuckingartisticactually way that often comes out of the independent music scene. 

I recorded the performance in a pretty simple way: 2 large diaphragm condensers in a mid-side stereo pattern. This works by combining the signal of one mic in cardioid pattern facing the front and another in figure of 8 pattern facing both sides. You double up the figure of 8 signal and invert the phase of one of those. Through magic I don't understand, this creates a nice, wide stereo field with a strong centre. I also had a boundary microphone on the back room of the wall to add extra detail (this comes into its own in the noisier parts of the show, when it really picks up the delay repeated keyboard bass notes), and took a direct out from the mixing desk to give me a clean vocal signal. The direct out is what means we can actually hear the boys' lyrics, and is the reason I had a tear in my eye at the end of the show, having been one of the only people in the room who heard exactly what Henry was saying in the midst of the music. 

I am immensely proud to have been a part of this and I hope that I am allowed to record many more Tiger and Panda records in the future. 

-Phil Dodd

live at cafe kino

I finished the artwork for this last week. It's been over a year since we made these recordings and we're finally ready to release them. It'll become available on the Polite Records page in the next couple of weeks. 

By the way, Tiger & Panda are playing in London with Goat on Saturday the 14th of December, where we'll be selling this new CD and a load of others. The show is hosted by Burn The Jukebox and will be at the Sebright Arms. This place claims to have an over 18s policy so if you're under 18 and want to go, let us know and we'll figure out how to work it!

kino zino

I really am making work, and in a visual medium see? It's not just gigs. Though having said that I will be playing guitar as part of Palomica this Thursday. It's a house show in London I think. i will try and get more details...

encyclopedia_hrjireland.pdf

The full Encyclopedia document is now available to download for free

It's formatted to fit nicely onto your e-reader or tablet device, if that's how you choose to live your life, otherwise it can be viewed on anything that reads .PDF format files.

So all the content is available for free. However, I've decided to offer a bespoke binding service, covering the cost of materials and labour for a hand bound artefact.

rob st john + the nervy betters

poster by Steve Brett

The Nervy Betters are going to be playing at Cafe Kino supporting Rob St John on Thursday the 2nd of May. The show is being organised by Stitch-Stitch Records. 

cafe kino and stitch-stitch present:

Rob St John
Lancastrian Rob St John plays drawn-out and ghostly songs underpinned by the creaks and drones of the harmonium, musical saw, fiddle, skittering drums, analogue synth and field recordings. Backed by a talented cast of collaborators and co-conspirators, his first album 'Weald' combined kraut, drone and psych influences with peals of British folk guitar and wheeling gusts of rich, cryptic vocals. Since then, he's been recording illegal bird hunting in Malta, field recording in Cornwall and curating the critically acclaimed Pendle, 1612 compilation. His new 7", Charcoal Black and the Bonny Grey / Shallow Brown, will be released on May Day.

The Nervy Betters
A mild-mannered experimental pop band, figuring out their place in the world.

Tickets £5 in advance, available from Bristol Ticket Shop

encyclopedia: a kind of press release

So it's finished. I'm pretty happy with it. It's more than a year's work.

I printed the inners at Hanway Print and silk-screen printed and bound the rest at home. The foil blocking on the cover was done at the Wyvern Bindery. I was looking into doing it myself but in the end the cost to set up would have been the same and I definitely wouldn't have done such a good job. I was also keen to give Wyvern Bindery some custom after all the friendly help I've had there in the past. They charge a setting fee of £25 for the first line of text and £5 for each additional line. Then it's about £5 per unit for every copy made after that. I think this is justifiable for an artist book.

Right now, I'm still figuring out how to present it. Doing readings is kind of limiting as this book kind of needs to be handled and leafed through to work as an artwork. My current plan is to hold some kind of event at Cafe Kino some time later this year.

I'm also thinking about offering a bespoke binding service for those who want their own personal copies. This makes more sense than mass producing and I don't want to charge for the content. Just the binding.

Speaking of which, I'm providing .PDF copies of this document free of charge to those who would like to read it (there will be some kind of 'this belongs to hrjireland' watermark on the pages) so if you'd like a copy, contact me somehow...

encyclopedia: stitched

!

prints in progress

I made prints from earlier sketches. Both of these are from music projects that I'll hopefully be finishing simultaneously. 

The year got off to a hectic start, but I'm slowly finishing a whole lot of projects. Our flat is full of brown parcels of materials. It's very exciting.

kino residency: prints and drawings

My last Cafe Kino event was in November and I hung some prints and drawings around the gallery and invited some friends to play some music and records down in the basement. It was a fun year and this work is still hanging in Kino for the foreseeable future, so stop by and have a look if you are in town.

kino residency: exhibition

 

 So, the Next event of my residency at Cafe Kino will be on Sunday the 25th of November (this Sunday) from 2pm

hey, come to a bunch of stuff at cafe kino with lots of everything everywhere!

i'm gonna hang an exhibition i think and there will be musicians and all...

t w o   w h i t e   c r a n e s | upstairs

roxy has been touring japan and meeting her new nephew and she is sure to have some amazing stories and excellent songs for us.

g e o r g e ' s   r e e l - t o - r e e l | downstairs
george has promised to perform his giant tape loop in kino's basement. he is the king of sound.

n i c o l   p a r k i n s o n   (frozy) | upstairs
nicol will be playing without irina and rhiannon, who are not around, but he will hopefully be joined by lots of friends. also, it's his birthday!

d j   c u p c a k e | downstairs
lisa will flip the black pancake and drop the needle in all of the latest and most up to date manners.

t i g e r   &   p a n d a | upstairs
we're going to meet up tomorrow and come up with two sets. the upstairs one with involve songs and hopefully some pals.

w e   w a n t e d   t o   b e   l i o n s | downstairs
jack writes plays and makes beats and is planning a special sound and spoken word performance down in the basement.

t i g e r   &   p a n d a | downstairs
so the second thing will have drums i think and remember, phil dodd will be recording the music on his 4-track casette-o-matic.

UPSTAIRS and DOWNSTAIRS at kino

while this is going on, i guess i'll go around kino and hang pictures throughout the day, so the exhibition will be growing over time... i hope.

performance times to come!

kino residency: music and movies

On Saturday the 25th of August 2012, Rachael Dadd and Ichi played at Cafe Kino as part of A Year With Henry Ireland. It was such a great evening of songs and short films and animations and it was Rachael's last gig before the birth of her and Ichi's baby!

I played a set of new songs on three instruments: A mandolin made by my grandpa, a ukulele that was my first guitar, and a banjo bought by my great grandfather when he ran away from home. Then I told a half improvised story based on conversations with people I had had with people in Cafe Kino that week. I finished the set by playing two short films: one animation I have since uploaded to youtube, and a recent music video made by Tiger & Panda that I will make available soon.

Ichi's set included instruments he had created specially for this show, including trumpet/harp combo and concluded with Ichi knocking a golf ball down the neck of his double bass and into his steal drum where it played melodies at random as it rolled around inside. The whole performance was full of noise, energy and humour and it was great to see Ichi joined on stage by Rachael for some sweet musical moments!

Rachael played lots of new songs with the help of a full band and she and Ichi also played a live accompaniment to Rachael's Balloon video as well as hand painted animations by her sister, Betsey Dadd. The most exciting part of the evening for me was seeing them joined on stage by a skype video of Kanoko Inoue and Aaron Sewards, playing a special song from Japan that Rachael and Ichi played along to.

 

kino residency: write good songs

Ellis (the sorry people)

Steve (the nervy betters)

George (the nervy betters/sound master)

Morbison

Morbison

Moscow Rules

Moscow Rules

Joan (morbison/the nervy betters)

The Sorry People

The Sorry People

The Nervy Betters ( nearly all these photos by Frances Dixon)

Write good songs was an evening of new bands and music held at Cafe Kino on Wednesday the 22nd of August 2012. It was Part of A Year With Henry Ireland. It was a free event and it was so much fun. There was a really great atmosphere and a good mix of musicses. 

Among those performing were members of An Axe, Grizzly and the Bears, Headfall, Two White Cranes, Trust Fund, Jelas, Tiger & Panda, I Know I Have No Collar and Box Car Aldous Huxley.

I remember hearing that Stitch-Stitch used to do evenings like this though I never made it to one. I hope we can do one again some day. First gigs are the best kind! 

kino residency: august

 photo by Frances Dixon

I spent August staying at my parents' house, working and putting on Cafe Kino events. Here are a few photos to summarise the whole thing. I'll make more detailed posts for the two main events (write good songs and music and movies) later. Also, here is a summary of the month in list form.

Frances and I found a place to have our wedding reception just before she left for China, so we parted in a great mood.

I spend the first week listening to old CDs and tapes, hanging out with my brother and his girlfriend and driving around visiting friends and their babies. I even caught Lauren between Afghanistan and somewhere else. Then my parents came home and we all went to the pub and I told them what was what for about two hours.

There were two weddings. One was of my old flatmate and friend Mark Slade, to Kerry, his girlfriend. Lots of babies there and lots of old pals. on the drive back, we visited my Grandparents and Aunt and Uncle.The second wedding was of Phil Dodd's brother, Pete and his girlfriend Lana. Grizzly and the Bears played!

Mostly I was working on projects and preparing for my week in Kino: 20th-25th Aug. The weekend before this, I stayed with Steve and Lisa and Sam in Lisa's house and we had a band practice for our new band The Nervy Betters in preparation for a new bands event on the following week. The next day, Lisa, Steve and I jumped on a big inflatable Stone Henge on College Green in Bristol.

Frances came back from China and I got to spend some time with her while looking for more Polite Records stuff to take to the British Library. We stayed up late Sunday night making a mixed tape for Cafe Kino. I made it on a blank tape my friend, Amy - 'primary care giver' - Parsons gave to me out of all the old CDs I had left behind when I left home.

For the next week, I spent time in and around Cafe Kino chatting and writing and drawing and preparing a story to be read out on Saturday the 25th of August. I stayed with the super generous Sarah and George and made them spinach and spring onion vegan pancakes for dinner as a thank you. 

Frances and I had an amazing curry with our friends Sarah-Jane and Daniel at Sarah-Jane's house in Yate. Daniel is going to go to Berlin to do an MA. He has been trying to do this for the last two years.

That week in Cafe Kino, I put on two events, with massive help from George and all at Kino. The first was called write good songs and was an evening of new bands and music ideas. The second was called music and movies and was an evening of songs and short films from Rachael Dadd, Ichi and me. It was also Rachael's last show before having her baby and she was joined on stage by a Skype video of Aaron and Kano in Japan. Kano is having a baby too!

Anyway, It was a fantastic three weeks and combined being busy with being on holiday in a way I wish I could make happen more often. I feel three years older, in a good way. I'm very grateful to everyone I got to spend time with over this month!