Mike Walker Interview on ALL FM

A world exclusive tonight on mine and Sam Andreae's EXR Jazz Unsigned radio show on ALL FM. We've got guitarist Mike Walker coming in with sax player Iain Dixon. Mike's new and first CD, 'Madhouse and the Whole Thing There' is at last finally completed and will be available soon from Jazz CDs. We'll be interviewing Mike and Iain about the new CD and playing some tracks. This will be the first time any of the material from the CD will have been aired so we're really excited to have this exclusive. Mike is not one short for words and there's quite a story behind the CD so we should be in for an entertaining show.


We'll also be playing tracks from a couple of new Manchester jazz ska bands, Skamel and Baked A La Ska . Like buses these new jazz ska bands. There'll also be the usual listings for the next couple of months and a few previews from the last two.

Listen online or tune in if you can. The show runs from 11pm to 1am tonight.

Happy-Go-Mike-Leigh

I've been in film mode for the last couple of days. Yesterday I went to the Cornerhouse to check out the new Mike Leigh film, 'Happy-Go-Lucky' which was introduced by the director himself and followed by a Q&A with Mike and one of the actresses, Kate O'Flynn who played Suzy in the film.


I'm pleased to report that it's a great fun film with a lot of laughs without being flippant and overly light. It tells the story of Poppy, a thirty year old primary school teacher renting a flat in Finsbury Park who goes about being happy, positive and generally getting on with life. A quite intentional aspect of the film is that she at first appears quite surface to the point of being annoying but you soon realise that she has great wit and intelligence and has a very positive influence on her friends and the world around her. Actress Sally Hawkins who plays Poppy gives a great performance full of charm and humour whilst delivering the more serious scenes with the perfect balance. The film was also a fab little nostalgia trip for me as it was set very near where I used to live in north Camden.

It was interesting to follow with a question and answer session that illuminated on some of the themes of the film. Mike confirmed that he wanted to show a more positive outlook than portrayed in many of his previous films but without ignoring the fact that Poppy is living in the same tough world, the difference being that she deals with life's difficulties in her own way. He also talked about his method of film making using improvisation around ideas and themes, in this case for six months before doing any filming. One questioner suggested that the film is quite feminist potraying women as succeeding in coping with life and the men the one's struggling, a view that Mike agreed with. He also talked about the somewhat ironic fact that he's seen by many as the London film maker despite being from Salford. He said that he'd like to make more films in the north but that it's too expensive up here and actually cheaper in London. This does seem very surprising but he didn't explain why this is the case. It would be a great shame for film making in Manchester if this is generally true. All in all it was a great evening and I'm really glad I went along.

The film theme unexpectedly continued into today. I've just got back from having lunch with my other half and a good mate Helle at the Continental Cafe in West Didsbury where lo and behold, legendary director Ken Loach was there having lunch as well. There were rumours he would be at the Q&A last night as he's in Manchester making a film at the moment. I'm not sure what the film is about or where this is happening. Somewhere near West Didsbury perhaps? Maybe some film buff could let me know.

A Tale of Two Cities

I'm on a brief trip to New York staying with an old friend Frank (François) in the Lower East Side. Frank has been living here for quite a few years now and we've had a few conversations about the rapid gentrification and dramatic change of his neighborhood. The New York Time Out guide suggests the locale is now being referred to as 'BelDel' (short for below Delancey St), much to Frank's horror. It seems like a similar story to the development of our Northern Quarter with bars and cafes replacing the shop fitting stores and clothing wholesalers, and the moniker of 'BelDel' being somewhat like our various new 'quarter' names. There's an implicit assumption that this is a bad thing driving rents up and forcing the artists out but I'm not sure this logic applies to Manchester. Having said that, everyone I meet in New York seems to be a film maker, model or musician so it doesn't seem too bad. Frank is a film editor on a reasonable income but still needs the assistance of a protected rent scheme to afford to stay, a legacy of the fact that he's been here since the area's pre-hip days. In Manchester's case maybe there's more positives than for the Lower East Side and I welcome at least some cafe culture appearing.

That aside I'm having a great time hanging out here, writing this post in one such hipster cafe, Brown on Hester St (pic above). Great coffee and baked eggs. I also checked out guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel at the Village Vanguard and spent a night in the Chelsea Hotel which was quite an experience. Some strange folk and great artwork but I still sensed an element of dated artificiality to it's rather forced bohemia.

No Static at All

I'm far too late getting the word out that I'm co-presenting a radio show with Sam Andreae from the RNCM starting tomorrow Monday 25th February on south Manchester's ALL FM 96.9. It's a late one running from 11pm to 1am so I'm not sure how many people will be listening but it should be good fun. It's part of a series of EXR Unsigned shows on ALL FM covering all styles of music. The shows will hopefully be available from the website as a 'listen again' but there's one or two things to sort out before this can happen I believe. Initially it's only going to be every other month so we'll see how it goes.

We'll mainly be playing tracks by unsigned local artists and we'll be getting in some of our local jazz talent for interviews and live sessions. On the first show we'll be interviewing sax player Andy Schofield and pianist Les Chisnall about their fab new CD 'Another Place' just out on the Cinnamon Club's new record label. We'll also be interviewing Anton Hunter about his free improvisation night at Fuel Cafe in Withington, The Noise Upstairs (reviewed below).

So give us a shout if you're doing the jazz thing and have tracks you'd like us to play and/or gigs to mention in our listings section. My EXR email address is ades@exr.org.uk.

Cor Baby That's Really Free

Having promised I would many times, I finally made it down to Anton's free improvisation soirée at Fuel Cafe in Withington last night, The Noise Upstairs - "An evening of uncomposed sounds... combining our backgrounds of jazz, contemporary classical and electro-acoustic music". Good fun it was too with the democratic principle of drawing three names out of a hat to form each improv trio being adhered to.

It was interesting to hear the different 'free' styles. The first trio consisting of a drummer and two saxes was clearly reminscent of classic 1960's free jazz, reminding me a little of the Art Ensemble of Chicago. It was especially effective when the two sax players came together for a long unison note and then drifted microtonally apart giving a bitter tasting atonal whining clash.

The second trio was a cello, violin and a mic'd muted trumpet through a series of multifarious effects units. I'm not at all familiar with classical free improv (any good suggestions?) but this trio again reminded me of stuff I've heard and seen in TV documentaries on people like Stockhausen. Anton joined in for the final ensemble of the evening on mandolin (ok it was a quartet to give everyone a bash). With the addition of violin, french horn (I think!) and electric guitar, much staccato stabs and scratching of bows on the back of violins made for a wholesome aural brew.


I joined in myself (see pic above) for one trio session and had scratch about on a few guitar strings running through buckets of delay and wah wah to create a back wash for my trombone and violin ensemble partners. This went into a heavily delayed Terry Riley'ish arpeggio thing that seemed to go down well with a few folk. Nice evening and highly recommended.

We Wuz Robsoned

Tedious, academic, disconnected and flat would have been the sum total of my review of the Phil Robson Quartet with legend Dave Liebman at the RNCM on Thursday the 31st of January 2008. So bad was it that I was planning my escape from my mid row seat, as I doubted I could take much more than about 10 minutes.


However I stuck it out, and the fourth slightly bluesy track was executed with a smidgeon of desperately needed feeling, albeit still barely registering on the Richter scale. The tracks largely consisted of harmonically complex but structurally basic repetitive forms. Liebman's playing felt unconvincing and uncommitted. The obligatory fast runs, outside lines, squeals and grunts were all dutifully in attendance but were delivered with such disconnectedness they registered no impact other than irritation. Some respite came from a pipe solo introduction to a version of Coltane’s ‘India’, this being the best part of the set by miles along with a decent bass solo from Aiden O'Donnell. Once the band joined in after the intro however, the energy once again died. Jeff William’s drumming was overly busy and lacked any sense of dynamic intensity. Phil Robson’s terse and unenthusiastic introductions were at least consistent with the music.

You're Never Gonna Do It Without Your Fez On

Word had clearly got around that this visit to Matt and Phreds on Wednesday 30th January 2008 by Bristol based quirksters 'The Blessing' was worth checking out. Being favoured by luminaries including Portishead and Robert Plant no doubt assured a degree of interest from outside the usual jazz rank and file. I caught The Blessing down in Bath a few weeks ago and was very impressed but uncertain whether they could whip up a similar storm on an away match. My fears were unfounded as they put on another great, if ever so slightly less intense show. The general vibe and a few specific motifs referenced the Polar Bear sound but there's a distinctly grittier funkier groove than the Londoners go for. The drummer Clive Deamer's drive and feel was quite delicious, pushing the whole thing along with an uplifting and smiley vibrancy.


The Blessing have no overtly chordal instrument in the line-up. This gives the sound a sense of openness and provides plenty of harmonic freedom for the mash and interplay of the lines from sax player Jake McMurchie and trumpeter Pete Judge. I loved the shamelessly bright and aggressive tone of bassist Jim Barr. It's refreshing to hear such unabashed plectrum riffing in the context of a jazz set. Much of the material had Caravanesque 'fez' minor movements reminiscent of Parker's 'Night in Tunisia' and tunes of that ilk. One or two rockabilly shuffles sneaked in occasionally and there was some prodigious use of noise terror delay effects to keep the tonalities suitably off balance. Pizza referencing track titles delivered with suitably laconic dryness from Mr Barr completed the left field nudge of this cool little combo.

Mysterious Traveller in a Stolen Caravan

Another one of those special big little gigs last night the 29th January down at the Carlton Club as part of the EXR jazz nights series. A last minute word of mouth text alerted me to what promised to be a good one with the Cinematic Orchestra's Luke Flowers on drums, ex-Cinematics John Ellis on piano and the Oedipal Jon Thorne on double bass. It was the first time I've managed to make it down to the Carlton Club and I was immediately taken with it's somewhat jaded boho vibe.

I presume due to the last minuteness it turned out to be a small affair. This made for an intensely personal and intimate gig in ours and a small quota of the MCR jazz community's honour (Whackabas' Jonas Backman and Gavin Barras joined us at the front table). Everyone was very quiet and one could almost hear the shuffling of Luke's denim in time with his kick drum swagger. I was recently enlightened to Luke's alternative monicker of 'Mr Tickle' which I have to say does seem very suitable given his lithe style and extensive reach.

The set opened with a classic sounding untitled song for a mysterious person by John Ellis. Jon Thorne announced a song he'd written for Mr Flowers called 'Cool Hand Luke' that fittingly featured some graceful and potent playing from the said man. John Ellis gave a great blues stomper rendition of 'Nobody's Fault But Mine' with some mighty singing from himself. Just before the end of the first set Jon Thorne shared with us that his main means of transport, a VW caravan had been stolen at 11.20pm the night before, adding an ironic twist to a forceful and fast version of 'Caravan'. The second set ended with a touchingly vulnerable rendition of Richard Iles' 'Old Friends' also sung by John with really quite moving words from guitarist Mike Walker.

This was kind of what it's all about really. Memorable.

Praise the Lord

A tip for what should be a good one this Wednesday 30th January at Matt and Phreds. I caught The Blessing a couple of weeks ago at The Bell in Bath and I was mightily impressed. They were on home turf and had a great crowd down that made for a brilliant atmosphere. Quite Polar Bear'ish, but with distinctly more funky style drums and bass than those influential Londoners. Comprising players favoured by Portishead and Robert Plant to name just two, they whipped a storm that I hope makes it up to Manchester this week. Bring your anoraks.

The Long, the Tall and the Shorter of it

It's been far too long since I've posted here so apologies. It's one man operation so it can be tricky to keep it moving along. A combination of a starting a new job, crimbo and illness have kept me away though I have sneaked out from time to time.

I swept the cobwebs out on Saturday the 5th of January with a visit to Liverpool to check out Wayne Shorter playing at the grand, if somewhat old fashioned feeling Liverpool Philharmonic Hall as part of the Fresh Festival. I'd hadn't realised until entering the hall and wondering if I was at the wrong concert that he was playing with the full size Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and not just a quartet as I was expecting. Wayne looked stately all in black and cut an elegant if modest figure in amongst the orchestra. He was a man of few words, only communicating once with the audience in a somewhat enigmatic manner, but there was no feeling distance despite this and the atmosphere was warm.

Not surprisingly given the set-up, the tunes were heavily arranged pieces and much of the time sounding very classical. I wasn't familiar with the material but it worked really well, particularly the second track, also appreciated by my Liverpool based mate, the kinetic Hannah Peel who came along to the gig with me. In many ways the focus wasn't on Wayne or the quartet but the orchestra and the overall compositions. Wayne's short improvisations were quite uncommitted and he seemed more focussed on taking in the overall impact of his orchestrations. This lack was made up for by the other members of the quartet, drummer Brian Blade, John Patitucci on double bass and Danilo Perez on piano, all playing with force and vigour.

An appropriately 'short' set at one hour plus an encore but a good one.