Gig flyers

I love drawing gig flyers!

Slagheap

Last night we went to The Victoria in Dalston to see Slagheap from Bristol and Nervous Twitch from Leeds.

Nervous Twitch are C86 style with a hint of surf.

Slagheap are my new favourite band! Gav said this gig was the best show we’ve been to this year and I agree. Slagheap sound like The Slits but are better musicians, more funny and more danceable. We bought their LP at the show and played it as soon as we got home. I hope they play in London again soon.

The Schizophonics

We went to the Lexington last night for an incredible and fun show by The Schizophonics from San Diego. The guitarist was all over the stage, doing moves like he was at Wigan Casino, all the time playing groovy fuzzy guitar. It was hard to believe that the band are just a 3 piece. The energy and fun of The Schizophonics is off the scale. My new favourite garage punk band! Can’t wait for them to play in London again!

Chew

At the Victoria, Dalston. Their first show in London.

Pussy Riot, Hagar The Womb, Hetze

Friday 20th May 2022, Het Depot, Leuven, Belgium.

This gig was a dream come true for me. After 6 months of intense learning I got to play guitar on stage with my favourite band at an amazing show.

First band of the night was locals Hetze. They are like a tornado; fast and in-your-face heavy punk, with short, tight songs that are full of energy and aggression. Hetze are coming to London in September to play Chimpyfest 2022, do not miss them!

Next up was us! I joined Hagar The Womb last September and have spent months learning to play their songs on guitar. The Hags were my favourites when I was a teenager, at that time the punk scene was completely male dominated and Hagar The Womb were one of very few bands of the time that I could relate to. I still love them and it is amazing to be playing with them.

We put on a lively and fun show and we had a great time playing. Karen and Ruth made it very clear what the band thought of Boris Johnson and Brexit, Mitch was in full-on show-off mode and the audience seemed to love it.

The lights went out and we were in darkness and then it was time for Pussy Riot. It was the first time I had seen Pussy Riot and I was completely blown away. Their show, Riot Days, tells the story of the Punk Prayer performance and their arrest, trial and imprisonment following it. Visuals including English translation of their words were projected behind them and the packed venue was captivated and in awe. Pussy Riot’s show is one of the most empowering and strong performances I have ever seen. Their strength and conviction is incredible, and it felt especially important to me (as a Brit) as our government is in the process of making protest illegal.

After Riot Days the group returned to the stage for a shorter performance in solidarity with Ukraine and to give a declaration of their opposition to the Russian invasion. Half of the merch sales for this tour will be donated to a Children’s hospital in Kiev.

Rabies Babies gig

Punk women, taking up the space we deserve.

Today we had a fun pre-gig practice with Mike (Dinosaur Skull) who is standing in for Tabi on drums at the Queens Head tomorrow. We are so excited about this gig, we’ve been playing gigs for almost 23 years and for most of that we’ve been the ‘token girls’ in a man’s domain. This is the first time we have played on such a female centric line up (Mike will be the only man on stage all night). 23 years ago we could only dream of this line up happening. Mike organised this gig, and when he was choosing the bands for the night he said that it didn’t hit him until the line up was fixed that he would be the only man on stage all night, and he said that he wants to wear a ‘token male’ T-shirt to the gig, (so I drew him wearing it).

Merry Xmas!

I realised that i haven’t posted for a while, i’ve still got a load of Euro football pics to put up, or maybe it’s too late now… Anyway, i did this the other day, a festive pic of Rabies Babies, for a Loud Women xmas gig flyer.

11th – 20th May

11 May: We watched Dirty Dancing and decided that we should practice our dirty dancing moves in case they ever made a follow up film and needed some new stars for the film. We were not feeling Alert, but we tried to Stay Alert.

12 May: Gav had the lockdown blues, Damaged Goods did a mail out about the Rabies Babies record, which was sort of sad because I am really missing having gigs and band practices. We went to bed early and listened to Gideon Coe’s show on 6music.

13 May: Work stuff.

14 May: I had to cycle in to work to take my back up.

15 & 16 May: ill again

17 May: A bit better, did cleaning (of me and the flat) and we tested out the inks for the screenprinted sleeve for the Rabies Babies record.

18 May: Slow internet and social distancing visitors.

19 May: Puffins!

20 May: The contrails are back ruining the sky.

Rabies Babies zine

I’ve started making a lyric zine for the new Rabies Babies record. All of the band members are illustrating songs, here’s a sneak preview of one that i’m doing….

Lockdown Diary

Thursday and Friday.

Lockdown Shopping Bingo

How to play:
1. Write a list of things that you would like to buy, things that are usually always in the shops.
2. Go shopping.
3. See how many you can buy off the list.

I played with Gav. We both wrote lists and he went out to the shops. We both scored 8 out of 11 items.

CORONA LOCK DOWN DIARY

Sunday to Wednesday. I had a wobble on Tuesday. I read on Twitter that we are not working from home, we are at home in a crisis, trying to work.
On Wednesday we invented Lockdown Shopping Bingo, which makes shopping more fun.

World Cup 2018 Zine!

I made a zine!
32 A5 pages of my drawings from the World Cup, featuring the goals, saves, celebrations, drama and fans!

Available to buy on Etsy

World Cup 2018 Part 3: Quarter Finals

Uruguay 0 – 2 France

Lloris has made some amazing saves this World Cup.
I suspect that he may be putting magnets in the ball.

Muslera’s own goal

 

Brazil 1 – 2 Belgium

Fernandinho’s own goal

 

93rd minute stretchy last minute save from Courtois

 

Sweden 0 – 2 England

Watching at my local pub.

 

Russia 2 – 2 Croatia

Croatia won on penalties  – (Croatia 4 – Russia 3)

Kramaric’s goal for Croatia.

World Cup 2018 Part 2: Round of 16

Drawings from the round of 16. Winner stays, loser leaves.

France 4 – 3 Argentina

The 10s.

Uruguay 2 – 1 Portugal

Ronaldo and his weird shorts action.

Cavani scores 2 goals.

 

Spain 1 +3 – 1 Russia +4

Penalties

 

Croatia 1- 1 Denmark

It was exciting for the first 4 minutes, when both teams scored, but then it got a bit dull. It went to extra time and then penalties.

Most interesting moment was realising that everyone on the pitch except the goalies are in red/white/black.

hmmm… bored….. LOOK! I’M ON TV!

darn…. lost on the sweepstake…

Brazil 2 – 0 Mexico

This World Cup has been quite bland for outrageous hair-dos. The Mexican team had fun with a bottle of bleach, strangely on the day that my colleague Adam came in to work with freshly bleached hair. This led to us speculating that he was moonlighting as a Mexican footballer. Sad to see Mexico knocked out.

Belgium 3 – 2 Japan

Chadli scores Belgium’s 3rd goal 20 seconds before the final whistle and saves us all from extra time.

Japan help tidy up the stadium after the game, even though their team is knocked out.

 

Colombia 1- 1 England 3

England win the penalties. For. The. First. Time. Ever.

Three

My little friend Ozzy is three.
Happy Birthday Ozzy!

Xavier, Snapped Ankles

At the Shaklewell Arms, London.

I can’t find any information about Xavier, they sound a bit like Boredoms but more groovy. I loved their set and I hope I get to see them again.

Snapped Ankles remind me of an 80’s squat party band; anarchic, visual and drum heavy. I’ve never seen the Shacklewell Arms so packed and everyone was dancing. You can’t not enjoy Snapped Ankles.

Argonaut, Rabies Babies, Thee Dinner Ladies, Militant Girlfriend

All ages/family friendly daytime gig put on by Loud Women at the Lexington.
Saturday 30th September.

All ages kid-friendly gigs are the way to go for so many reasons!

1. You get to hang out with your friends who have kids and can rarely come along to gigs.
2. Kid-friendly gigs are in the day time! You can also fit another gig in later in the evening, so doubling your gig-going potential.
3. Kid friendly gigs are just MORE FUN! Where else do you get offered sherbet dib-dabs or Love Hearts as you walk in the venue? Where else is the promoter of the event dressed as Wonder Woman? Where else do you find yourself enthusiastically making lightning shapes while watching the excellent Argonauts?

I’d never been to such a fun gig. The kids had a great time, and so did the adults.

Argonauts kicked off the afternoon with a fantastic set and lots of props, and everyone loved them. They handed out kazoos and gave us dancing instructions for audience participation, encouraged a stage invasion for ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’ and passed around bananas for their singalong version of ‘The Banana Splits’ theme.

In between bands there was stories for the kids while the grown ups drank beers.

Next on was my band, Rabies Babies. This show was the second time that our guitarist Laura’s toddler son has been at a Rabies Babies gig, he doesn’t really like us. We are too shouty and he gets frightened. This time he didn’t cry for the whole time we played, so we are slowly winning him over. We re-worked out set – we dropped some of the inappropriate sweary songs and added some kid-friendly songs. Our drummer Mike ended up playing guitar and drums at the same time for one song so Laura could run about on stage pretending to be an elephant. There was a boy of 5 or 6 who was right at the front and slam danced and pogoed non stop all the way through our set.

Thee Dinner Ladies are just plain and simple brilliant garage. Musically they are right up my street, they are garage punk with equal measures of punk and garage. Shouty fun male & female vocals with flirty lines like “you’re only shopping cos you fancy me”. All this, plus the whole band are dressed spectacularly as dinner ladies. Who doesn’t love a dinner lady?

Sadly I missed the final band, Militant Girlfriend, as I had a train to catch to get me to a wedding in Sheffield, hopefully I’ll get to see them soon.

Roll on next Little Loud Women show!

Why Birds Sing

The Aurora Orchestra, conducted by Nicholas Collon.
Royal Festival Hall, Southbank, London.

First half pieces & text by Olivier Messiaen, Kate Wakeling, Brett Dean, György Ligeti.
The first half of the performance ended with the musicians placing ticking metronomes on the edge of the stage, kneeling next to them and making origami cranes. The audience were invited to add their own cranes during the interval.

The second half was Beethoven’s 6th Symphony, The Pastoral. The orchestra stood, playing the whole symphony from memory, surrounded by paper cranes and fairy lights, some parts of the symphony were played in the dark, with the musicians wearing illuminated paper cranes on their wrists. Because the musicians were playing from memory they were able to move around and change positions. In the second movement the strings moved back and the woodwind came to the front, which absolutely changed the perception of the piece. The bird songs between the flute and oboe became far more prominent and alive.

The encore was a repeat of a part of the Pastoral, but with the orchestra spread out amongst the audience, so that the we were surrounded by the music.

It was incredible.

watch a clip of the encore

Womens Euros 2017 #22

Netherlands 4 – 2 Denmark

What an exciting final!!!! This has to be the most exciting final in the history of football!
The pitch was filled with amazing players, but one of my favourites from the whole fantastic tournament has to be Van De Sanden. What a star!

Womens Euros 2017 #20

Denmark 0 – 0 Austria (penalties)

I watched sneaky bits of the first half at work, then cycled home, found my brother Jamie hungry on my doorstep, after a London to Edinburgh cycle ride. Gav was supposed to be cooking dinner but he was in the pub, so I cooked dinner in record time and we made it on to the sofa, beers in hand, to watch the penalties after extra time.

Womens Euros #19

OH NO!!!!
Karen Bardsley broke her leg in the France – England game. She is such a hero that she kept playing for a while, and she didn’t need a stretcher.
All faith now in Siobhan Chamberlain for the semi finals against Netherlands.

Womens Euros #18

England 1 – 0 France

We shouted so loud at the telly.
Jodie Taylor scored her 5th goal of the tournament and won England a place in the semi finals.

Womens Euros #17

Austria – Spain

It was a no score draw, but Austria won on penalties and it was Adios to Spain.