Daemonia
I donned the finery of a debonair Dennis Wheatley-esque Satanist in order to attend a rare UK performance by Daemonia, the band led by former Goblin keyboard maestro Claudio Simonetti, last Saturday night. He’s one from the left below, though sadly in this photo he isn’t sporting the fetching half-moon reading glasses - with spectacle cord - that he wore on the night.
The crowd at Slimelight was somewhat sparse, but counted amongst its number none other than Doug Bradley - Pinhead from Hellraiser. The band were outstanding, and played all the classic Dario Argento themes including Profondo Rosso and Suspira. They also performed a cheeky medley of Halloween and Tubular Bells in a jazz-rock style, and overall put on a stunning show of old-school prog-jazz classical-synth-rock soundtrackery.
It was a shame to miss the Sisters Of Transistors gig that the other two-thirds of the group attended, but if anything could equal that, it was surely Daemonia.
The Sisters of Transistors
On Saturday 1st Dec, Mei Yau and I went to see the Sisters of Transistors at the George Tavern in East London. The group are a new project from Graham Massey of 808 State, and their myspace page describes them thus:
The Sisters Of Transistors (S.O.T.) are a Combo Organ Quartet and Ladies Social Club. S.O.T. hold weekly afternoon workshops at the Museum. Members who graduated this year are Sister Wigby Elka Whippany Sister Ragna Teisco Dottir Sister Naomi Doric Pencrest & Sister Henrietta Vox Humana S.O.T. play a selection of fully working exhibition organs with an emphasis on the Italian models from the early 1970s. Accompanied on drums by museum curator, Prof. Vernon World. Repertoire includes a mixture of S.O.T originals in the style of baroque disco prog (B.D.P.) and classics from the golden age of Horror OST (H.O.S.T ).
They lived up to the description. Live, the Sisters of Transistors were mostly instrumental, with six vintage synths blazing and live drums by Massey played over laptop beat tracks. I can’t recommend them enough. I was also thrilled to discover that Die Die Deneuve were supporting, as I saw them at an art squat party about a year ago and they were excellent. They played the gig in a slimmed-down two-member incarnation called Plug, and they were great.
Listen!
http://www.myspace.com/thesistersoftransistors
http://www.myspace.com/diediedeneuve
Mei Yau has a brand new hat!
BADGES!
We now have lovely Hong Kong In The 60s badges. If you want one, please email us.
South Eats London
On Saturday 27th October we played at the opening night of South Eats London at the Deptford Arms in New Cross. Good night, cool venue, nice crowd (apart from a few creepy drunk guys who turned up later in the night) and we felt it was probably our best live performance so far. We were also able to enjoy an excellent set by our good friends Shimura Curves, and what we believe to have been the debut performance of Dora Brilliant. Unfortunately, no photos have yet emerged of us actually performing, but here is a picture in which Mei Yau and I are (just) visible enjoying one of the other bands:
Super Pop Art
Things have calmed down a bit now so I’d better give a report about the PopArt superhero all dayer. We were rather pleased about how our covers of Brainiac’s Daughter and That’s Really Super, Supergirl went; we worked on them specially for the gig and it was the first time we played them in front of an audience, and probably will be the only time. Two superhero-themed XTC songs back-to-back - what a concept!
Another first for us: our gig got reviewed. It’s strange to realise that one is public property now. I mean, if you put yourself out there, play live, have websites and the like, then people have a right to talk about you I suppose. It’s just very weird to have strangers do it without any prompting from you!
Anyway, more gigs should be coming up in the autumn so I look forward more reviews.
Thanks to Simon Scott for taking lots of great pictures of us! See them here.
Lostmusic gig
The turnout for this was a little sparse, probably because of an enforced venue change late in the day to dreaded South London (am I the only person sad enough to live down here?). However, we didn’t mind, as it was a nice venue, our set went quite well and we got to meet and watch the delectable Mono Taxi. So thanks very much to Trev and Lostmusic for putting us on. You can see some photos of us and the other bands that our host took here.
Valerie & Her Week of Wonders
Mei Yau and I watched something last night that we must recommend to you. It’s a Czech film from 1970 called Valerie a týden divů (Valerie and Her Week of Wonders), and you can read about it on this Wikipedia page.
This story of 13-year old Valerie’s blossoming adulthood is a beautiful and nightmarish haze, told through a succession of disturbing visuals and situations. The film seriously is a trip, and it’s really inspired us. Please look forward to our new vampire/incest direction.
The soundtrack has recently been made available, and we want it. It’s available here and here, among other places.
A Long Overdue Report
I almost forgot to report back on the the Bloomsbury Bowl gig that we played last week! The venue was great as always and we had some apparently-prize-winning hot dogs there. Organ Morgan, who headlined, were very good too.
I have to say we were rather taken aback by the first public airing of Insignia, a song we’ve had for a while; the new backing track took on a character in a live setting that none of us could have possibly predicted and, frankly, we were ill-prepared for the dance-rock juggernaut that came out of our amps. It was a lesson learned.
Here we are looking pretty cool:
At The Good Ship
Here’s a slideshow of photos from our gig at The Good Ship.
For a full-screen slideshow, or if it isn’t working above, click here.
On The Beach
Prior to our first full concert at The Good Ship on the 29th of June, the band went to Cornwall. We walked on cliffs, got wet, skimmed stones, visited a monkey sanctuary, and watched Action Jackson one and a half times. After this, we were more than ready to perform.
All © Hong Kong In The 60s, 2007
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