Newton Faulkner at Oxford Art Factory

NEWTON FAULKNER
ERIN MARSHALL
26/08/09

Through a winning smile, Erin Marshall (pictured below) played a selection of acoustic pop songs from her upcoming EP, Things I Can’t Change. Sometimes breezy, sometimes pensive, but always accessible, Marshall’s tunes are the kind you’d hear on the radio and then find yourself humming for the next couple of days. A perfect example of this was Hard Case To Crack, an insanely infectious swing/jazz/pop number which had the crowd clapping along as she bounced around the stage with her acoustic guitar. Boasting oodles of charisma and a note-perfect and seemingly effortless vocal, big things could lie ahead for this singer/songwriter from Sydney.

Dreadlocked Englishman Newton Faulkner (pictured, top) really knows his way around a guitar. Within seconds of stepping on stage, his hands were flying all over the place in a blur of motion, his fingers crawling up the fret-board like spiders on speed. He drummed beats on the guitar’s body and played a specially adapted pedal-board organ with his shoeless feet. It was mesmerising.
 An affable character, he encouraged crowd participation at every possible juncture, played along to a cassette tape and busted out a mini-guitar for She’s Got The Time and the imaginatively titled follow-up She’s Got The Time 2. However, fun as all this was, his more serious songs were actually his best, like the rousing Dream Catch Me and his take on Massive Attack’s Teardrop. The highlight was his final offering: the stripped-down I’m Not Giving Up Yet from his imminent second album, Rebuilt By Humans. This song served to illustrate the only slightly frustrating aspect of the evening. Simply, for someone who can write a beautiful, meaningful ballad like this and who has such a great vocal, he spends a little bit too much time farting around with things like UFO (“better watch out for the anal probe”). While we might only be scratching the surface of his talent, with a few more songs like his set-closer, and less time spent getting the crowd to sing along as if they were pirates with rabies, Faulkner could really be one of the standout songwriters of his generation.

The Return of Giant Drag

You may remember that, last year, I wrote about how Giant Drag's Annie Hardy - having parted company with both her record company and the other half of her band, drummer/keyboardist Micah Calabrese - was trying to scrape together enough dosh to release a new record. How was she planning to do this? Basically, by calling on donations from her loyal fanbase in exchange for a shout-out on the liner notes and by rummaging around under her bed and finding cool Giant Drag memorabilia to sell on ebay.

Without the clout of a label to support her, the eighteen-months or so since she had this idea have been hard work for Hardy, but things are finally starting to come together. Having unsuccessfully trialled different band members to replace Micah, the two are now back together. It is unclear whether or not this is a long-term reunion, but the insanely-talented pair are set to take the stage for some September shows in LA with The Charlatans. In terms of new material, enough money was raised to record an EP, which should see the light of day soon. Excitingly (considering how their debut long-player, Heart and Unicorns, was one of the albums of the Millennium so far), work is set to begin on a new album later in the year.

Recently, the duo played a four song session for groupee.com. Showing a natural progression from their first record, Giant Drag's post-grunge sound is as edgy, fresh and exciting as ever, and it's great to have a naturally charismatic, captivating front-woman like Hardy back on the scene. Amongst the songs they showcased was a brand new track, Mess If My Face:
Also performed was the title track of the highly anticipated EP, Swan Song:


The band also played YFLMD from the first record, and another newie, Stuff To Live For. Check these songs out over at Groupee.

UPDATE: The Charlatans shows have been cancelled, so I hear.

A Phoenix finally rising from the ashes

My weekly column has started up again for the football season. This year, it's in The Argus on a Thursday, not a Saturday. The wordcount is up to 550 now. Ooh. Here is this week's:I’m lucky enough to have seen some beautiful sights in recent years. I’ve watched the sunset turn Ayers Rock the deepest orange. I’ve gazed in marvel from an aeroplane window at illuminated streets flowing like lava through the blackness of the New York night. I’ve stood in the Colosseum, surrounded by the aura of ghosts from its brutal Roman history. I’ve been dwarfed by the steel magnificence of the Eiffel Tower in Paris and strolled the gothic backstreets of Barcelona. However, last week I saw a sight during my humdrum daily routine in familiar old East Sussex that topped anything I have ever seen before.

I was on the train from Brighton to Eastbourne when I noticed something that made my stomach turn somersaults and the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. It was a fleeting moment, yet one so perfect that I will always remember it. I was staring vacantly out of the window as the train chugged past Falmer station when I noticed, poking up from behind some trees, the tiniest glimpse of a metal structure. This may not seem like much to get excited about but, of course, this skeletal framework represented so much more than the sum of its parts. To me, and to all supporters of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club, it is a Phoenix finally rising from the ashes, an embryonic vision of what will soon be Albion’s shiny new home.

Earlier this year I was at the Olympiastadion in Berlin. After a quick wander around to take in its history (it was there that black athlete, Jesse Owens, famously won four Olympic gold medals while Adolf Hitler watched on), I sat in the stand and breathed in my surroundings. Being a stadium nerd, this magnificent theatre of sport had me drooling, with its 3,500 ton roof and bright blue running track, and it made me think about how amazing it will be to finally get to Falmer. However, at the time, the idea of sitting in a comfortable ground, with decent acoustics and a roof over my head every fortnight seemed, somehow, still so far-fetched. Sure, as I was pondering this, work on the Falmer site had started, but it hadn’t amounted to much more than a few diggers churning through some fields. I had always said that, because the quest for Brighton's stadium had been going on for so long, I’d half-resigned myself to it never actually being built, and that I wouldn’t believe it was really going to happen until I saw the first brick being laid. Well, with a simple peek over the trees from the train window, I have now, finally, seen it with my own two eyes. It looked more like the picture above then the one below (which is what it will eventually become), but was still beautiful.If you haven’t already done so, then check out the stadium gallery on the Albion’s website. With photographs showing how it is taking shape remarkably quickly, it’s the best thing I’ve seen on the internet since I typed ‘lion reunion’ into youtube.

Regardless of whether I’m spending ages online, looking at photos of what is surely the most exciting construction site ever, or catching a real life glance out of a train window, I can finally now allow myself to really believe, with no degree of uncertainty whatsoever, that the Falmer stadium is on its way. And what a great feeling that is.