This year’s line-up features, in no particular order, The Strange Death of Liberal England (will they have room for all those signs?), Monsters Build Mean Robots, Shapes, Evi Vine, The Continuous Battle of Order, Crowns on the Rats Orchestra, Alright the Captain, The Slow Revolt, Juffage, Last Days of Lorca, Nordic Giants, Theo, Kontakte, Orders of the British Empire, Speak Galactic, Crooked Mountain Crooked Sea, Silent Front, These Monsters, Delta Sleep, A Genuine Freakshow, Karhide, Dark Dark Horse, Laish, Sorebones (loeb), Karl-Johan Nilsson, and Lowland Runners.

NWFA are also offering up a bunch of tracks for free download on their FB page, so hit that up if you like free songs. Songs by The Continuous Battle of Order, Orders of the British Empire, Silent Front, Nordic Giants and Last Days of Lorca, for example. Yes?

See you there.

…if you can make it down, we’d love to see you there!

Possibly a bit nepotistic as she used to drum for us and is friends with the two original members of the band, but she’s no bullshitter and notes she was “very pleased I didn’t have to lie when Ben and Shanu asked what I honestly thought!”

Read the review here.

Click here to check out the gigs I’m hoping to get to.

I’ve not seen the film and I probably won’t go and see it (looks a bit Lahndan gangster mate innit), but I’ve been asked to point out that the song ‘I Start Fires We Start Riots’ is by Last Days of Lorca, and NOT by Muse. It’s part of a cunning plan to get the right band name showing up in Google results, do you see? Seems only fair that the right band get attributed. Oh yes, and the band are playing Brighton soon.

Anyway, here’s a clip from the film with the song in the background:

That’s enough promotional material on behalf of friends for now… apart from mentioning that The Offcuts, Another Day Lost, ASBO Retards, Bull See Red and Harmful Effects are playing the Greenhouse Effect in Brighton on Friday November 13th, and I’ll be there celebrating my twenty somethingth birthday. So come on down!

Oct 18th – This Will Destroy You, And So I Watch You From Afar – Audio, £8

Oct 19th – Dalek – Audio, £9.50

Oct 22nd – Run, WALK! – Belushi’s, £?

Oct 25th – Sloath, Decapante, Ox Scapula – Prince Albert, £5

Oct 27th – This Town Needs Guns, Tubelord – Freebutt, £6.50

Oct 27th – Burning Love (ex-Cursed), Trippin’ Violet, Blackstorm – Engine Room, £5

Oct 28th – Dananananaykroyd, Dinosaur Pile-Up – Audio, £8.50

Oct 28th – Shield Your Eyes, P For Persia, Illness – Caroline of Brunswick, £free

Oct 30th – Architects, Despised Icon, Horse the Band, As Blood runs Black, Iwrestledabear – Concorde2, £?

Nov 6th – Youves, Calories, Shoes & Socks Off, Swims – Freebutt – £6.50

Nov 9th – Oxbow, Plague Sermon – Prince Albert, £8.50

Nov 13th – The Offcuts, ?, £?

Nov 13th – GBH – Engine Room, £8.50

Nov 17th – UK Subs – Engine Room, £10.50

Nov 25th – The Germs – Engine Room, £14

Dec 9th – Bob Mould – Concorde2, £16.50

Dec 14th – Dillinger 4, Ted Leo, Hard Skin + Four Letter Word (maybe?) – Engine Room, £8.50

Dec 17th – UK Subs – Engine Room – £11

Dec 22nd – Casiotone For The Painfully Alone – Freebutt, £?

Dec ?? – Drag The River, Chris Wollard & The Ship Thieves – TBC, £TBC

Feb 15th – Cannibal Corpse – Engine Room, £8.50

• HOLY MONSTERS! (Interview with Kevin ‘the fucking’ Douche of Big Scary Monsters emo mega-tapping Record Label!) – To celebrate this release I got to interview BSM head honcho Kev Douche. I had to speak to many employees and ring back many times to their huge offices, before eventually securing a brief 15 minutes with the great man in his office. His walls were coated in gold discs, he was smoking a huge cigar and had a sweet crushed green velvet suit on when I interviewed him….Here is what went down.
  Tags: labels music interview
• Blog Scary Monsters: Clash of the titans – To promote Holy Monsters!, the forthcoming marriage of convenience between BSM and Holy Roar, Alex (Mr Holy Roar) and I decided to interview one another. As expected, it was a fairly dramatic affair, often descending into name calling and stereotype lauding, but you might be able to pick some interesting information out of it somewhere.
  Tags: music labels interview
• Hold Your Horse Is on MySpace Music – Excellent rocksome indie band from Hampshire.
  Tags: band music
• American psychos – Right-wing Americans are said to believe in small government. Certainly, where that government is doing something to look after poor people, they are opposed to it. But historically, the state’s legitimacy has always been unquestioned when it functioned as the racial state. When it functions in a racial capacity, either through its capacity to imprison, police, blockade immigration, or make war, its legitimacy is assured. I am not saying that these functions of the state can be reduced to racism – far from it. But if you think of America’s astonishingly high prison population, the severity of its policing, the regularity and expense of its wars, the byzantine bureaucracies devoted to policing immigration, and the trashing of civil liberties – all of these are accepted by a sufficient number of people because of America’s unique racial dynamics.
  Tags: USA race racism power politics immigration war prison healthcare police reform
• SourceWatch – Welcome to SourceWatch—your guide to the names behind the news. SourceWatch is a collaborative project of the Center for Media and Democracy to produce a directory of the people, organizations and issues shaping the public agenda. A primary purpose of SourceWatch is documenting the PR and propaganda activities of public relations firms and public relations professionals engaged in managing and manipulating public perception, opinion and policy. SourceWatch also includes profiles on think tanks, industry-funded organizations and industry-friendly experts that work to influence public opinion and public policy on behalf of corporations, governments and special interests. Over time, SourceWatch has broadened to include others involved in public debates including media outlets, journalists, government agencies, activists and nongovernmental organizations. Unlike some other wikis, SourceWatch has a policy of strict referencing, and is overseen by a paid editor.
  Tags: journalism research information database media propaganda thinktanks activism politics reference wiki
• LENIN’S TOMB: Straining for effect – Interesting piece about the decline of “the war on terror” as an imperialist meta-narrative, and the grasping, wan nature of current pro-war agitprop.
  Tags: imperialism war propaganda humanitarianintervention afghanistan USA britain
• Interview with Sarah Lipstate! – Fresh off her tour with Parts & Labor in Berlin and Norway, Sarah Lipstate these days can be found with a double necked guitar and Moogerfooger Ring Modulator pedal for her solo project Noveller. With her second album Paint on Shadows, Sarah has carved out a niche for herself mixing Phillip Glass like minimalism with pulsing meditative rhythms. Just this week Sarah announced that she was parting ways with Parts & Labor to focus on Noveller and her film making career. We caught up with Sarah to see what she’s been up to.
  Tags: band music interview experimental
• Punknews.org | Frank Turner (Part 2) – The second part of an interview with Frank Turner.
  Tags: band music interview
• The Sandwiches – An EP stream by OrgCore in-joke pop-punk band the Sandwiches… I don’t know why they exist but I’m kinda happy they do.
  Tags: band music
• A culture of fear – Liberal spaces within Europe have brought many more Muslim women out of their old confinements Europe is at risk of being ‘colonised’ by its Muslim populations, argue a number of bestselling new books, acclaimed across the political spectrum. How has such hysteria gone unchallenged? Pankaj Mishra on the ‘Eurabia-mongers’
  Tags: islamophobia racism europe multiculturalism
• concert listings for brighton, england – brighton gigs provides information about live music in the Brighton area, sourced from public data available via the Last.fm API. The best way to keep up to date is to follow the twitter bot, or subscribe to the twitter RSS feed.
  Tags: brighton gigs livemusic
• Caustic Cover Critic: Deeply Odd POD – It does the soul good, every now and then, to point at book covers gone terribly wrong. Sometimes I’m not a fan of a cover, and I say so, but I feel a bit bad, as it’s a matter of taste, and maybe I’m wrong. Sometimes, though, there’s no way I could be wrong.
  Tags: books covers design art funny awful POD

It seems that the Freebutt is no longer owned and run by the Joiners, and is now under the command of a local consortium of four blokes who have the good taste in music (I met one of them on Friday; he was wearing a Holy Roar t-shirt and played the Murder City Devils and This Will Destroy You among many other fine bands). Since independently owned and run venues are rare and getting rarer in today’s Brighton, I hope you’ll join me in supporting the ‘butt and the Penthouse bar when you can.

Aug 16th – World Inferno Friendship Society – Engine Room, £8.50

Aug 16th – Spraynard, Bangers, Break The Habit, Big City Plan – Hector’s House, £free

Aug 18th – Wooden Shjips, You’re Smiling Now But Soon We’ll All Turn Into Demons, Soul Punch – Freebutt, £7.50

Aug 18th – Voodoo Glow Skulls (yes, again!) – Engine Room, £?

Aug 21st – Dinosaur Jr – Concorde2, £17.50

Aug 27th – Subhumans – Engine Room, £8.50

Aug 29th – Fake Problems, Riverboat Gamblers – Freebutt, £7.50

Sept 3rd – Paint It Black – Freebutt, £8.50

Sept 17th – Kayo Dot, Manatees, Blackstorm – Freebutt, £7

Sept 25th – Citizen Fish – Engine Ro0ms, £8.50

Sept 27th – Fuck Buttons – Audio, £8.50

Oct 4th – Obits (ex-Hot Snakes, Drive Like Jehu) – Freebutt, £?

Oct 9th – Johnny Foreigner – Audio, £7.50

Oct 10th – The Slits – Concorde2, £13

Oct 18th – This Will Destroy You, And So I Watch You From Afar – Audio, £?

Oct 19th – Dalek – Audio, £9.50

Oct 28th – Dananananaykroyd – Audio, £8.50

Dec 14th – Dillinger 4 – Engine Room, £8.50

If no supports are listed, or the price is £?, that means I don’t have the details, couldn’t remember them, or was otherwise too lazy to go and find out. Sue me.

Sun July 12th – An Albatross, Rodeo Death Burger, Open Waters – Freebutt, £6.50

Wed July 15th – Funeral Hag (friend’s extreme metal band) – Prince Albert, £free

Sun July 19th – Brighton Breakout 2009 (The Zatopeks, The Accelerators, The Hotlines, The Bat Bites, Those Damn Owls, The Atoms, The Grizzley Ends) – Hobgoblin, 4pm, £donations

Sun July 26th – Lavotchin, Crocus, Our Time Down Here – Hobgoblin, £donations

Aug 4th – Voodoo Glow Skulls – Albert, £8.50

Aug 16th – World Inferno Friendship Society – Engine Room, £8.50

Aug 16th – Spraynard, Bangers, Break The Habit, Big City Plan – Hector’s House, £free

Aug 21st – Dinosaur Jr – Concorde2, £17.50

Aug 27th – Subhumans – Engine Room, £8.50

Aug 29th – Fake Problems, Riverboat Gamblers – Freebutt, £7.50

Sept 3rd – Paint It Black – Freebutt, £8.50

Oct 9th – Johnny Foreigner – Audio, £7.50

Oct 18th – This Will Destroy You, And So I Watch You From Afar – Audio, £?

Oct 28th – Dananananaykroyd – Audio, £8.50

Dec 8th? – Dillinger 4 (not confirmed, but!!)

Dec 11th-13th – Ten Years of ATP Festival (woohoo!) – Butlins Minehead

• Neither a Contract Nor a Promise: Five Movements To Watch Out For – It’s been a while since we’ve had some red-hot literary-movement action. Part of the problem is that the declaration of such movements, schools, salons, moments, manifestoes, sets, etc, tends to be a post-facto thing. Someone–a participant or otherwise–notices a bunch of writers and artists doing some stuff through which the observer considers there to be some shared thread(s). Give it a name, and boom: performative taxonomy complete.
  Tags: literature criticism funny chinamieville writing genre fiction
• “God, that’s a merciless question”: China Mieville’s Interview From Weird Tales – Last year, I interviewed China Miéville for Weird Tales’ 85th anniversary issue. I’m posting the full interview now, on my blog, because I think it’s relatively unique, in that China was between books and the point of the interview was more about discussing “weird” fiction. So the emphasis is a little different than in some of his other interviews. And, because it was conducted via IM, there’s an interesting flow to the conversation. Besides, you gotta love an interview that mentions not only Cloverfield and Vin Diesel but the aesthetics of the weird, and ends in a face-off between reptiles and mammals.
  Tags: fiction writing prose literature criticism chinamieville fantasy weird monsters deathoftheauthor politics
• British Newspapers – 1800-1900 – One century of archived British newspapers.
  Tags: history britain newspaper media UK resources reference archive
• Diary of a Defiance: Iran un-Interrupted – This nation, as always, can take care of itself. It needs nothing but the active solidarity of ordinary people around the globe to be a witness to their struggles and demand from their media an accurate and comprehensive representation of their movement. So please, hands off Iran! No “democracy project,” no sanction, no threat, no military attack, no regime change.
  Tags: Iran electoralpolitics democracy middleast
• The Angry Arab News Service: Iranian developments – Typically, I support neither side in the Iranian situation: but I support those Iranians who are struggling against both sides. I have worried before about the impact of Ahmadinajad’s stupid rhetoric on the Iranian public attitudes toward the Palestinian question. I am in no way sympathetic to Moussavi. He is a man who suddenly discovered the virtues of democracy. When he was prime minister back in the 1980s, he presided over a regime far more oppressive than Ahmadinajad’s.
  Tags: Iran electoralpolitics democracy solidarity middleeast
• Ahmadinejad Won. Get Over It. – Without any evidence, many U.S. politicians and “Iran experts” have dismissed Iranian President Ahmadinejad’s reelection Friday, with 62.6 percent of the vote, as fraud. They ignore the fact that Ahmadinejad’s 62.6 percent of the vote in this year’s election is essentially the same as the 61.69 percent he received in the final count of the 2005 presidential election, when he trounced former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. The “Iran experts’” shock at Friday’s results is entirely self-generated, based on their preferred assumptions and wishful thinking.
  Tags: Iran electoralpolitics electoralfraud middleeast democracy USA pundits
• These are the birth pangs of Obama’s new regional order – “They have elected a ­Labour government,” a Savoy diner famously declared on the night of Britain’s election landslide in 1945. “The country will never stand for it.” From the evidence so far coming out of Iran, something similar seems to be ­happening on the streets of Tehran – and in the western capitals just as desperate to see the back of Iranian president ­Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
  Tags: Iran politics electoralpolitics electoralfraud middleeast USA democracy coups
• What can the opposition win? – If the protest movement were to die down following a recount in which Mousavi won, the result would probably be a few blunted reforms coupled with a more aggressive neoliberal policy. If a dozen deaths are to mean anything, the movement must surely acquire an independent organisational backbone to sustain it when the inevitable disappointments come.
  Tags: Iran electoralpolitics democracy middleeast solidarity
• SchNEWS 679 – Well Unfair Reform – With unemployment in Britain passing the two million mark and steadily rising, the government is seemingly still clinging to a fantasy that they can boot everybody off benefits and into non-existent jobs. The Welfare Reform Bill received its first airing in the House Of Lords this Wednesday, proposing a dismantling of the welfare system on a scale Margaret Thatcher would be proud of if she still had any marbles left.
  Tags: welfare britain newlabour policy government reform
• Italian government to legalise vigilantes… – The Italian government has just issued a White paper on law and order that gives the go-ahead to private vigilante groups. While the paper states that such groups will have to sign up to a licensing scheme, it’s interesting to take a peek at those who are enthusiastically jumping at the opportunity.
  Tags: vigilantes rightwing paramilitaries italy europe fascism oligarchiccapitalism stateterror silvioberlusconi
• Andrew Humbled By Hungry Kids Of Hungary – Some good advice on reviewing music.
  Tags: writing music reviewing musicjournalism
• What’s in a booking fee? – Despite the best efforts of Pearl Jam and Bruce Springsteen, Ticketmaster still rakes in millions in ‘service fees’ for concert tickets – but where does all the money go?
  Tags: music bands gigs livemusic corporategreed
• Conversing with myself and another: DiS meets Future Of The Left – Future Of The Left’s Andy Falkous is a man with a lot to say. If you’ve seen their titanic live show, you’ll no doubt be aware of his sardonic wit; the between-song banter is something which – for better or worse – they’ve become renowned for, as well as putting on one heck of a rock show. But what, exactly, makes him tick?
  Tags: music band interview futureoftheleft
• Shut Up, Bands – because bands say the stupidest things.
  Tags: bands music funny blog