Miacca: Tia leaves the band

Posted by jamie on Jan 9, 2012

Today we received the sad news that Tia Kalmaru has left Miacca.  We’re still big fans of both, and the good news is that they’re all still big fans of each other.

Here’s what Ti told us:

Everything’s cool and everyone’s still friends and the band are carrying on with another member.. can you also remind people of the slackers gig?

It is my regret to announce that I am leaving Miacca. After 2 years of travelling round in a sweaty car, eating junk food, sleeping in the most uncomfortable places, having no money, failing at education and generally having the best time of my life, it’s time to move on to the next phase of my life. It’s been an almost impossible decision to make as my band mates have supported me through the hardest times of my life. They will carry on without me, with another guitarist and are going to do all gigs that are already booked.

Aislinn, Joe and Damon, good luck guys, make 2012 your year!  It’s been a pleasure playing with you guys and I wish you (plus new guitarist) the very best of luck, thanks everyone who supported the band while I was a member, you all helped me grow as a person, as well as musically, in ways you can’t imagine. Keep supporting, they’re just getting started Ti ♥

To see Miacca’s show with Jaya the Cat and the Slackers, go here.

To get Slackers tickets, go here.

Slackers: 2012 dates and tickets

Posted by jamie on Dec 13, 2011

Our mates, the ever dapper New Town Kings will take their swing-core two-tone sound on tour with The Slackers next Spring.  

The brilliantly chaotic Tyrannosaurus Alan replace Broken Nose, and join in on all dates EXCEPT Bristol. 

See it on facebook here.
Get tickets here.

APRIL 2012

13th LONDON ISLINGTON O2 ACADEMY  *early show*
14th BRISTOL FLEECE
15th MANCHESTER MOHO LIVE
16th NEWCASTLE TRILLIANS
17th LEEDS COCKPIT
18th SOUTHAMPTON CELLAR

There will be more dates to come in August 2012

 

Slackers: new record

Posted by jamie on Dec 9, 2011

NYC jazz/ska/soul legends the Slackers popped in to tell us about their newest record.  Here’s what they had to say:

Our latest release is a compilation of familiar and unfamilar cover tunes. Old favorites like “Strychnine” get the studio treatment, and classics like “I’m Still Standing” get the proper Slackers reinvention. It’s part of the Whatevski Big Tunes Project, an initiative to help put out more great records, give our bands better support, and open a co-op digital store where any ska band, artist, or label can sell music and build a community.
Check it out here.

Or hear a sample track here:

Here’s the full track list:

1 Attitude (The Misfits)
2 Like A Virgin (Madonna)
3 Strychnine (The Sonics)
4 I’m Still Standing (Elton John)
5 Jeepster (T-Rex)
6 The Letter (The Box Tops)
7 Game of Love (Wayne Fontana)
8 Reach Out (The Four Tops)
9 Bitch (The Rolling Stones)
10 Ganbare (The Blue Hearts)
11 Volunteers (Jefferson Airplane)

 

Picture taken at this show, where Gecko and the Slackers slayed Camden’s Jazz Cafe.  Whether you’re a person or a panda.

Slackers: UK tour dates for May 2011

Posted by jamie on May 12, 2011

Wonderful news: the Slackers return to the UK this month celebrating two whole decades as a band.  To mark the occasion. they’ll have Stash Box, a strictly limited CD compilation of 21 ‘fan favourites and feature tracks culled from the Special Potato and Epitaph archives’. Stash Box will only be available from the merch table at shows.

Those shows are:

27/05 – London, O2 Academy, Islington
28/05 – Leicester, Donkey Bar
29/05 – Belfast, Empire
30/05 – Newcastle, Trillians
31/05 – Manchester, Moho Live
01/06 – Derby, Old Bell

Support comes from the Exposed and Dirty Revolution on selected dates.

 

The tracklisting for Stash Box is:

1. Pedophila
2. Run Away
3. Keep It Simple
4. This Is The Night
5. Married Girl
6. Everyday Is Sunday
7. Nurse
8. Yes It’s True
9. What Went Wrong
10. Peculiar
11. Old Dog
12. Wasted Days
13. I Still Love You
14. Close My Eyes
15. Keep Him Away
16. Watch This
17. Have The Time
18. Rude + Reckless
19. Sarah
20. Feed My Girl
21. Pedophilia*

*’Pedophilia’ appears on the tracklisting twice, possibly a typo.   Punktastic are speculating that ”chances are one of these is Propaganda”.  I’m just going to leave it.

2011: Dave Hillyard

Posted by jamie on Jan 10, 2011

Slackers sax man, music sage and all-round champion David Hillyard has some tour dates out for his other project, the Rocksteady 7.  They’re in Europe during January and February.  The last remaining tickets will be here until they get snapped up.

The band have released a cover of Howlin Wolf’s Evil, and there’s talk of lots of other enw songs waiting to get out.  Rumours of a new album are only rumours thus far, but you’ll know as soon as we do.

Thanks to Musical Occupation for this story.

Slackers / Gecko: Jazz Cafe

Posted by jamie on Aug 11, 2010

Gecko, the Slackers

 

Jazz Café, Camden

 

10^th August, 2010

 

Jamie

 

This was my first trip to Camden’s Jazz Café, though not for want of trying.  Trying, in fact, to the point where I’d developed a bit of a complex about the place.  Why do I never manage to get there?  What actually goes on inside.  In the end I spent the afternoon daydreaming about some kind of Bugsy Malone-style prohibition era speakeasy, packed with a dense fog of cigar smoke, and old men puffing away like toads.  It’s not like that.  The closest I saw to a gangster was a poster up saying MOP are playing there soon.  Right.

 

Still, they’re also getting Chaka Demus and Pliers, and the bouncer was really nice.  He ID’d us all and then said “thank you.  Enjoy the show”.  Charming chap – he should get a job over the road at the Odeon.  They’re all nice people there.

 

The rush down meant we missed the start of Gecko’s set.  It’s a shame, because they were really up for this show, and had made the effort to dress up especially and look sharp, even sharper than usual.  Still, we were in not long after and quickly in to the happily swaying early crowd.  As always, Gecko have brought a big posse with them, but they’ve obviously made a few new friends tonight as well: the thoughtful, pleasantly surprised faces on cautiously swaying bodies betrayed a fair few folk discovering and enjoying a great new band.  It’s a great feeling, isn’t it, that?

Gecko are on form too, fittingly, and the night’s off to a bang: their idiosyncratic take on uplifting acoustic pop is an ideal choice to open the night tonight, and quickly fills the room with a rich, smooth sound – this is a really top, confident performance, and all the tiniest little details in their sound are really honed.  They look and sound confident, still lovably cheeky-chappie, but polished and self-assured at the same time.  The Jazz Café are eating out of their hand, and really getting in to it.  You can see it most obviously in the Library They’re playing with a bigger PA than I’ve seen them with before and the quality is really good too.  The overall effect is just mint.

 

By the time Falling Down and the new song Camden get an outing the room is bobbing along very happily.  I especially like Will’s line “whether you’re a person or a panda”, but that’s for a CD review.  Camden, though, gets a big “ahh”, from the growing crowd, because it’s a new song and it’s shy.  Clearly, then, it’s all working out for Gecko.

 

The last two get split up with a pretend encore, with their anthem Guanabana Juice announced as the last song, and the deadpanned “well, this is unprecedented” introducing an encore of Toots and the Maytals’ 54/46 that later becomes Pressure Drop.  You can’t help but feel that these guys won a few more hearts tonight.

 

The Slackers enter to a giant roar and, as you’d expect, milk it for all it’s worth, before setting about turning the heat and the volume up a few levels.  They set off with a quickened up Keep It Simple.  They’re playing a set, two, actually, that’s made mostly of requests and a few rarities seeing as they were here just a few weeks ago.  A quick hunt through their discography, though, reveals jus how many songs they actually have to choose from.  I was taking notes, but struggled to keep up (alright, I couldn’t stop dancing) and it seems the set list I managed to nab off of Jay’s amp at the end had long since gone out the window.  Fried Chicken  was definitely in there, and there was one point where Vic stopped to tell a story about not knowing who he was or where he lived and ended up rambling his way in to the Stones’ Get Off My Cloud and morphing it, without warning or explanation in to the Troggs’ Wild Thing.  It’s tough to say for sure, but you’d have to doubt those were requests, even if there is a slightly older crowd here tonight (no offence, guys).

 

In keeping with the venue and with the theme, the night became more and more like one of the more old-school shows, each of the songs being broken down, and everyone getting a solo.  Dave’s doing most of the serious talking while Vic, in his top-hat, keeps it entertaining with his shuffling, rambling speeches.  At one point he claims that his true family/genetic background originally came from the swamp. How it Feels and Not Enough to Feed My Girl are next, but it’s all mashing in to one, really.  Come Back, Mr Tragedy and Please Decide bring the first half to a close.  There’s a fifteen minute interval (that was when I found the MOP poster) and time for London’s most expensive cider. 

 

There’s also time for one of life’s great celeb moments.  Glen Pine, my favourite Slacker, came and tickled Chips on the head.  It was beautiful.  *sigh*

 

It’s much the same vein as before, but quicker.  Run Away and Tool Shed both get an outing before Peculiar becomes a surreal, drawn out, improvised jam thing.  It’s very exciting.  The party continues, faster and faster, hotter and hotter, and a lot of legs are starting to get sore.  From being squashed right up next to the stage you can see the rest of the front row snake all around the room and a few are skanking from memory by now.  But in a good way.

 

Exhausted, we make it to an encore that centres around Propaganda, and some shouted conversation that Vic has had with a girl squashed in just along from us earlier on.

 

“What’s your name?”  “Propaganda!”

“How are you ?”  “Propagandaaa!”

 

“What’s your sign?”  “Propagandaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”

 

That was Vic’s recollection of it anyway.  Going on the rest of thenight she might actually have told him she was from the swamp.  You never know.

 

It’s been a long night.  Exhilarating, but long, and hot.  The Slackers were impossibly good fun.  Half stumbling, we pick our way through discarded Red Stripe cans and out in to the aftermath of a rain storm.  It’s getting on for midnight, it’s pitch dark and the street’s soaking wet, but it’s still warm outside, and, you can’t help but feel, we’re all still warm on the inside.

 

 

Gecko’s next London show is at the Water Rats on Thursday 30^th September.

 

Slackers: tour dates

Posted by jamie on Jul 24, 2010

More and more new tour dates.  The Slackers have posted theirs here.

New Slackers tour dates

Posted by jamie on Dec 20, 2009

Slackers tour/tunes

Posted by jamie on Apr 2, 2009

New Slackers tunes and dates at their myspace (and ours).  The tour starts in May and hits the UK on the 15th.