Marc Reck

This copied from our Mr Elephant Website

Mr Elephant’s Second Birthday Review by Dom Brotherton

A Large Slice of Birthday Cake – Mr Elephant is Putting on Weight!!

Since its inception in 2007, Mr Elephant has been on a steadily increasing diet of eclecticism, celebrating some of the best underground club nights, djs, vjs, live bands, dancers, performers and inhabitants that Birmingham has to offer. Now with 5 residencies all offering different slices of Birmingham’s nightlife, it seems appropriate to celebrate Mr Elephants success by sticking 2 candles in a cake to mark its second birthday, but on the 23rd May there was a whole lot more on the cards than our average birthday party…

Throughout the afternoon there were opportunities for all ages to learn an array of different skills in a series of grass-roots workshops, and in most cases enabling those involved to participate in the performances of the night. Drumming, vjing, djing, beatboxing, poi, animation, etc, all workshops were offered for free to anyone who wanted to try the various creative artforms, and were hosted by an excellent cast of contributors.

As the sun set, the herd moved in-doors to be entertained by a fine hour of acoustic music from two of Birmingham’s most modest stars, namely Richard Batsford and Laura Louise, who both delivered magical performances.

At 10pm the Osmosis hosted Dance Stage kicked off with phat breaks & banging techno, while the Live Stage commenced with the mighty Jam Jah reggae collective, who got people up and grooving, providing the perfect backdrop to those of the audience who were adding the finishing touches to their carnival masks.

As the crowd welled up, the 1st band of the night Circadia took to the stage with new changes to the line-up adding more seasoning to their tasty flavour of psychedelic ska.

Up next was a crowd pleasing half hour of monkey swing from Marc Reck,

followed by the now infamous mr elephant midnight parade, which invited all poodle creations out for their midnight dance-floor stroll, and offering two prizes for best in breed.

Following, was an unexpected drumming jam session with beat boxer and host of the Live Stage, Bass6, who as always, entertained and mediated with more energy than an army of Duracell bunnies.

With the night in full swing, Bristol beat-boxer extraordinaire, Dub FX took control, complimented perfectly by talented female MC, Flower Fairy. There was a lot of buzz around Dub Fx, and he certainly didn’t disappoint! With just his mouth and a loop station with efx unit, he created phat beats, huge basslines and orchestral melodies that cranked up the atmosphere with each track.

With the crowd almost at fever pitch, the 3 piece live dub, breaks & drum & bass act Alphadrive, delivered a slick set of some of filthiest breaks I’ve ever heard come out of a live band, before handing over once again to Marc Reck who delivered a massive drum & bass finale ending with don’t worry be happy as a 2nd encore.

Over on the Dance Stage techno superstar Jerome Hill was rinsing it out with a hugely powerful set which sent the osmonauts into overdrive, in amongst big birthday sets from 32DM, Hijacker, and the mighty Dk Roon who finished things off with a big bang.

Massive applause is also necessary for visuals maestros Blendstate and The Lab for providing some truly awesome visuals; always interesting, innovative and apt for the occasion.

Mr Elephant comes off as a much more dynamic event than your usual club night, and feels closer to a festival than a club night. Always looking to broaden horizons, it off-sets different musical genres and strives to include much more than just DJs, visuals and a space to dance in the quest to create something groundbreaking, inclusive, and celebratory. Adding to the diverse range of musical styles and the conglomerate social strata that regularly appear at Mr Elephant events, even the barrier of age was broken by the scurry of little feet in the workshops that began early in the day, and it’s refreshing to see an event that appeals to such a huge range of tastes, and ages!

Mr Elephant doesn’t have punters; it has contributors; and the evolution of audience participation from an amusing quirk to a fully fledged feature is a wonderful thing to see, because it gives us all more ownership over the event, engaging us well beyond the boundaries of the venue. Even after the final curtain call, the place was rife with chit-chat and the exchange of phone-numbers, and it’s fantastic to experience such a collective engagement, rather than the typical race for an unoccupied taxi. (My own eventual exit was met by communal singing and a drum performance by an enthusiastic fellow whose flow was only ended after 15 minutes or so due to apparent complaints from the neighbours.)

The organisers of Mr Elephant turn clubbing into a real adventure and I love that they want to celebrate the fun of interaction and offer so many ways for everyone be part of the festivities whilst also having a real desire to make elephant noises about their home city of Birmingham. With the Party Rockin Mammal Sessions @ Bulls Head showcasing Birmingham djs, The Live & Free events @ Adam & Eve showcasing live bands, the new Cinephonic & Intermix events @ the Hare pushing dj & vj boundaries, and with the forthcoming grassroots workshop programme, elephant radio shows, elephant tv, and their large website – www.mrelephant.com, it seems that there are now plenty of large tasty elephant portions that we can feast on in between the big festival style events, and it only looks to be getting bigger and more inclusive! Mr Elephant clearly invites us all to join the conga, if not start our own, so let’s put on our dancing shoes, bang on the Brum, and celebrate!

By Dominik Kai Brotherton

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Massive thanks and respect to Dom for that review and to the Night Times for publishing it! Jack Brabant, and Jules Hyland were videoing the event and Jack is putting together the entire 12 hour footage into a 4 minute video, so that will be online hopefully by mid June. Also Tony from the Lab will be putting together the Elephant Tv dvd episodes which will should be online by July.

Feel free to subscribe to the Rss if you want automatic notification, and we look out for more photos and videos as they return, plus a special Jam Jah recording of their set on Mr Elephant Radio, when it finds a new time slot.

Tony from The Lab who hosted vj workshops, vjed all night, and is to be producing Mr Elephant T.v has wrote his review of the Mr Elephant 2nd Birthday, so until he has a log in on this site (big elephant things afoot with The Lab) i’ll post it. The link one of his many excellent sites is http://www.vurt.org.uk

After three hours sleep, I’m awake! and running through the final kit checks for the train journey to Brum. Not only the Mr Elephant birthday party, but also my first VJ workshop. This will be seen as an introduction to hardware VJing using the Edirol kit I have now assembled. With an early start to these preceeding scheduled for 3pm, it’s all hands on decks wilst myself and Liam setup the two rooms for the evenings mayhem and merriement. Anyway, the hardware tutorials went (I think) well, and the star pupil without a shadow of doubt was Charly. Talk about getting it quickly or duck to water (or do feel free to enter your own analogy for that matter) anyhow, I digress ….

Even when I cheekily stepped away from the mixer for a bit and watched, I was bloody impressed! Hopefully though, the participants of the said workshop enjoyed themselves and have a smidge of a better understanding of what a hardware VJ actually does (apart from getting asked to put on some abba or R n bloody bee). Throughout the workshop, Mr Elephants two superb guest camera ops (Jack Braybant and Julie Hyland) were running around the event capturing loads of footage from the setup, the workshops and into the night. I can’t wait to see the footage and begin the editing for Mr E TV!

The night kicked off with a superb loop set from Laura Louise in which I had the oppertunity to play with the mixer and get in some nice feedback effects for her entire set with additional content coming from Liam (Blendstate). Caught up with Mike Freear of Alphadrive before his gig too, absolute top bloke !!! I loved the music! (I danced the whole set!), the energy (did I mention I danced the whole set?), and the reaction of all those sweaty, jumping about bods that were at the front of the stage! and then the finalae from Marc Reck himself was a joy to VJ to. This gentle reader then led to an early morning unwind back at the hostess of the night’s abode. Thanks must go to Laura for the music, hospitality and tea.

As per usual though, there were so many people that came together to macke this an absolute blinder of an event, and I’d like to thank Marc and Pyn for encouraging me to actually begin with the workshops that have been on a drawing board for so long, Liam for lights, visuals and his siter workshop on software vjing, Rich batsford for an amazing set, the osmosis boys for a storming night of techno and heavy breaks (class work!), Charley for participating and playing!, Laura for a storming opening set and hospitality, and Mr Mike Freear and Alphadrive! Hope to catch ya when you visit these lands further south.

Sleep however, never came … and around half nine I was off on my train travels again back to Leicester for the finale of my weekend!

It’s something else to actually see some of the energy and preparation that goes into creating such a mammal and Marc and Pyn have it down to a tee. The revellers were taken on an ecletic evening of sound and light that puts all of the Leicester events to shame. I look forwards to working closer with Marc and Pyn over the coming months and can wholeheartedly recommend that everyone has to experiance a Mr Elephant party at least three times in their life.

This copied from our Mr Elephant Website

Project X Presents was, and continues to be a huge inspiration to Mr Elephant. Some of us have been involved with Project X from the start, and Mr Elephant was born out of the experience of the first Project X Presents Event, the early Rockfall events, and a lot of what was going on in Birmingham at the time.

One of those things that was going on in brum was the noise abatement orders Our first home for the first Project X Event, and the first Mr Elephant festival style events – Epic Skate Park, ended up being shut down due to one obsessive complainer. Then followed the first home for the Mr Elephant Family Events – The Prince of Wales, which Keith & Diane were again really keen to use for arty and community events, but yet again they are facing more and more restrictive legislation, which pretty much stops them doing anything.

All of the above events were very safe, full of lovely people, incorporated both family events in the day and music events on the evening and generated a wealth of positive response from all ages, yet both events were not able to continue at the venues, because of the restrictions imposed upon them by the council. Its worth noting that our 6th event host – the fabulous the Rainbow Beach for Celebrate Birmingham’s Underground was also under scrutiny, and it seems that all these venue owners, (promoters and collectives) are all just trying to do great stuff for Birmingham, always at great financial risk, but seem to be constantly limited by the very council who is looking to put Birmingham on the map with the big city plan!?

Following some initial conversations with John Tigue and John Mostyn, the stirrer and created in birmingham was the first time we read about all this online, and it inspired 3 investigative reports from Ruth Robinson on Digbeth (who herself has a deep interest and experience in the development of areas). They raised an interesting question of whether the complaints were also linked in with the developers plans, and whether the intention to close venues down was not because of any real problems or issues, but to develop the vision of splitting Digbeth in quarters, as part of the Big City Plan, regardless of the impact on business and the city.

We’re not sure, but it leads really nicely onto this insightful Project X Presents video – Music Is Not Pollution, with interviews from John (Spotted Dog), Keith (Epic/Prince), Kent (Rainbow), and an abacus resident, all of which raise some very interesting points. One of which being why would the council want to stop such venues when there is such a huge support for them and only a handful of complaints, and when they are wanting to put Birmingham on the map in such a big way.

If you have anything to say, please feel free to comment. Now we’ve got the website going again, this video has inspired us to follow up some interviews we did in 2007. We’ll post links to any further debate from the Project X Presents collective, and anything else we can find, and feel free to add links yourself in comments

This copied from our Mr Elephant Website

For anyone who is interested in trying out the free mr elephant workshops on saturday here’s the programme.

All workshops are FREE, and are aim to give you a taster of various creative artforms in a grassroots stylee.

Some are drop in, Some are tasters, and some will enable suitable participants to perform on the night.

If you want to try out any of the workshops, booking will be on a 1st come 1st served basis from 2pm as from the drop in workshops.
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Main Room : (These workshops must be booked from 2pm on the day)
3.15 – 4.15 – LYRICS and LOOPS – Laura Louise – All Ages
4.30– 5.30 – DRUMMING – Jon Elliot – All Ages
5.45 – 6.15 – BEAT BOXING – Bass6 – Adults
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Room 2 : (These workshops must be booked from 2pm on the day)
3.00 – 3.30 – V.J WORKSHOP The Lab/Blendstate – Adults
4.00 – 4.30 – V.J WORKSHOP The Lab/Blendstate – Adults
4.45 – 5.15 – D.J TASTER WORKSHOP – Marc Reck – Adults
5.30– 6.00 – V.J WORKSHOP – The Lab/Blendstate – Adults
6.15 – 7.00 – D.J SCRATCH WORKSHOP – Jerome Hill (t.b.c) – Adults
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The Garage : (Drop in workshops from 3pm and 7pm – no need to book)

ANIMATION – (to be shown as part of the V.J set on the night) – Claire Evans – All Ages
MASK DECORATING – (Decorate a card mask/elephant flyer) – Jen Commins – All Ages
POODLE PUPPETS – (Poodles will be part of the performance) – Pyn Stockman – All Ages
POI SPINNING – (Festival style poi in the Sun) – Alice Branston – All Ages

(All ages welcome (children must be accompanied by an adult at all times)

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The sun is shining, and the forecast for saturday is hot, so here’s the evenings entertainment for our 12 hour 2nd birthday this Saturday @ the Hare & Hounds.

Please note the Acoustic & Live Stage will be in Room 1 & the Osmosis Room & Dance Stage will be in Room 2.

For the acoustic sets (9pm – 10pm) we will have tables and candles, so please arrive early in order to get a seat and relax with a beer, so you can see the very special acoustic gig from Rich Batsford & Laura Louise.

Acoustic Stage (8pm – 10pm)
8pm – Doors Open (Live Stage) – Soundtrack music
9pm – Laura Louise (Live Loop Pedal / Flute / Beatbox / Vocals)
9.30- Rich Batsford (Piano & Vocals)

Live Stage (10pm – 3am) (Hosted by Bass6)
10pm-Jam Jah (Reggae)
11pm – Circadia (Live Instruments, Electronics, & Skankin)
11.30pm – Marc Reck (Monkey Swing Set)
12pm – The Mr Elephant Midnight Parade (Hosted By Bass6) – Parade Your Mask & Promenade Your Poodle – Prizes for best mask and poodle plus the Percussion Jam (Drummers welcome), Interactive Performers (Their Dogs may bite) & the return of the Kazoos.
12.30 – Dub Fx (Amazing Orchestral Beatbox!)
1.15 – Alphadrive (Live Dub, Breaks & Drum & Bass)
2am – Marc Reck, Bass6 & Mike Freer Celebration Rinseout.
3am – Banana Boat Song!

Dance Stage (10pm – 3am) – Hosted By Osmosis
10pm – Hijacker (Osmosis Resident )
11pm – 32DM (Very Special Birthday Set)
12.15 – Jerome Hill (International Techno Breaks Legend)
1.45 – Dk Roon (El Presidento)
3am – Just one more!

As always if you’d like to get involved with Midnight Parade and/or win a prize, then make sure you make your mask (Cut out/Decorate Mr Elephant flyer) before midnight , or create your Poodle in the day.

If you are a drummer and want to have a jam at midnight, then bring your drum or email us at mrelephantpresents@gmail.com

There are advance tickets still available from https://www.theticketsellers.co.uk/buy_tickets/events/?id=10007138

N.B – Please note that this is a Not for Profit event, and tickets are (always) based on the venue’s maximum capacity to cover as many of the costs as possible.

NB 2- Entry into the the event will be from the back of the Room 1, (which you access from the “rear smoking garden”) & there will be a steward on the stairs to guide you if you haven’t been to the venue before.

NB 3 – If you haven’t checked out the artists, please check this blog post out with videos and links. – http://www.mrelephant.com/events/featured/mr-elephants-2nd-birthday-bank-holiday-celebration-hare-hounds-saturday-may-23rd-2009

Hope you have a huge bank holiday celebration whatever you do, and the doors always open if you want to get involved with the next Mr Elephant event or workshops – mrelephantpresents@gmail.com

P.S In order to thank everyone for the huge amount of work that has gone into this event, we will be having a free party the following week at the Adam & Eve on Sat 30th May til 4am, so please look out for the invite.

Here’s the breaks charts for the May/June issue of the Night Times

Update : Here’s the scanned in version, or click for a readable version here

Jadell – Break to the Beat – Rocstar – This track is the first i’ve heard of Jadell, and i love it. Classic drum loops and rolling funky ass stabs. Perfect for dancing, great fun to scratch to, and all round feel good record, with plenty of changes to keep you locked all the way through. Break to the beat will be released on the 31st May 2009, with a one week online exclusive on beatport on 25th May.

Rob Sparx – Fixed Up – Z Audio – The first track of his new album Trooper this is one great opener for a breaks set. Sounds like something awakening, and reminds me of one of my favourite progressive breaks mixes by Phil Kaye. After the intro, it rolls smoothly into a nice subby kick and line, with nice percussion, and sun kissed soundscapes, setting the scene to take your set wherever you choose. There’s a load of great tracks on the album, and a series of remixes to follow, (which if you’re a dubstep fan, you def need to check out.) Trooper is due to be released in May on Z Audio label, and you can catch Rob Sparx in brum at After Dark at the Que Club on 6th June.

Mr No Hands – Chuggy – No Handed Music – This is probably my favourite track to date from the producer (hands down and one that sets off every dancefloor i’ve dropped it on. This was out back in January but i still play it at most opportunities, and its a great release which builds suspense and energy on the floor. Chuggy is an apt title, with a great rolling feel, some slick beats, choice rhythmical vocals and a proper nice “chuggy” bassline. Buy it on No Handed music now!

Rico Tubbs – Party Time (Splitloop Remix) – Menu Music – There’s a load of great Rico Tubbs remixes on this double remix ep – Knuckle Sandwich Remixed, and a host of styles to choose from, (electro, dubstep, breaks, fidget, acid house, drum & bass, etc). This track from Splitloop was one of my personal favourites, and has all the elements of a proper party breaks track (doing exactly what it says on the tin!) Knuckle Sandwich Remixed is set to drop in May/June on the mighty Menu Music Label, and is definitely one to check out whatever your style.

BBB – Let The Bass – Standard Audio – Released back in March, this one has been tearing up the floors ever since, and is a huge tune, that will rinse out any breaks floor. Old school vocals, a charging bassline, some awesome edits, alongside some infectiously funky licks keep you locked from start to finish, and when it drops, it really drops, with some of the best build ups i’ve heard for a while. Big, big room breaks, and a must have record released on Standard Audio…and available now.

Black Canvas – We Fear Not (Ed Solo & Skool Of Thought mix) – Cool & Deadly – The new Black Canvas album aptly entitled Rise, is being released on Tayo & Skool of Thought’s Label , and features a whole range of styles, with some cool remixes from some big names, including Chase and Status and of course these boys. Ed Solo & Skool of Thought have all of their signature elements in full effect with this track..nice tightly produced breaks, those dirty bouncing basslines, their fine use of reggae guitar licks and sun kissed arpeggios, and all working nice and sweetly with Black Canvas’s choice rhythmical vocal melodies. Black Canvas album will be out Cool & Deadly in June 2009, and well worth checking out.

Just back from the clear up of our Xhibition, and still reeling from what a great night i had in the Cross on Saturday! I missed all the happenings around Moseley in the day, as i working on my set for the night took a lot longer than i’d anticipated, but from a dj point of view i’m a so glad i did, as that was sincerely one of the best dj experiences i’ve had, and proper great night of music and visuals.

Not forgetting the comedy at the start of course. Rich had sorted a great comic, who came down before a gig at the Glee Club. He started on the floor as opposed to the stage, which was a great touch at the start, as made everything feel more balanced, but also meant when people came in, because of the layout of the Cross, that the room was split into too, which must have been pretty difficult to perform.

Following that was Rich Batsford and Leon Chromatouch, who performed a beautiful set. I captured a bit of it on me camera below.

plus these a few stills like this one, which are on the flickr set here

Following some more music from me (i was playing in between bands, which when its a diverse as project x, i really enjoy) we had a set from the Lazy Lizards, who got people up and dancing with their spanish influenced acoustic worldbeat music. I’d seen them play once before with Rich at Bohemian Jukebox, and liked their set / bought a cd, etc.

After some scratching and dancing music, the mighty Cracked Actors were up, and as usual, didn’t fail to deliver with a crowd pleasing set of ska which got the whole room boucing.

I caught a little bit on the video again, and i was real impressed by their swing moves after their set!

Then it was my couple of hours, which like i say, was a great experience for me dj wise. I must now apologise for this next paragraph, as its about me, from my point of view, but honestly, it meant a lot, so please avert your eyes if your adverse to self postivity online. For my set I got to play Scratching, Funk, Swing, House, Breaks, Drum & Bass, and then back into chillout, and the crowd response was amazing/inspiring…i absolutlly loved every minute, and remembered why i love djing so much.

The reason i’d missed most of the event in the day, was because i wanted to mix all the live music in the same way that we mix the electronic music, and it took a fair bit of planning to get there, but teh reaction meant it was all well worth it, and throughout the set, people came up with champagne, warm handshakes and proper lovely comments! A guy who was best mates with one of the headline djs of Ministry of Sound was well into it, and even said something along the lines of there was nothing that comes close to what i was doing, it was another level compared to what his mate and the biig names were doing, and that he’s been in the game for 15 years down in London! Inspiring stuff, which put me on cloud nine for the rest of the weekend.

Right far too much about me…If you dont say it no-one will know right…anyway, back to the night. After a little break outside, walking down the entrance hall of laughs, and hearing some faint noises of the now infamous buzz boxes, it was time for Rohit and his band, which comprised of tabla, sitar and bass. Sitar’s always a difficult one to mic up, but when that was sorted a truly beautiful sound filled the cross. Tabla is the one for me..probably my favourite of all the hand drum sounds, but together with the sitar and the bass, it was a really fitting end to another great project X presents.

There are so many people involved in just that one part of the xhibition…much more than on the actual stage, and the whole event over the day saw “xhibitions” by all manner of creative people. I wont list them now, but i do advise checking out our www.projectxpresents.com website, as it is soon to be updated, to feature a lot of the footage created for the xhibition.

This copied from our Mr Elephant website
p style=”text-align: center;”>After 2 years and 14 events at 6 of our favourite Birmingham venues, the time has come to celebrate Mr Elephant’s 2nd birthday with our biggest festival style celebration to date, featuring lots of interactivity for all ages, the launch of Elephant Workshops in conjunction with Dramask, and the community based Elephant Tv project in partnership with The Lab.

On Saturday 23rd May 2009 @ the Hare and Hounds, Kings Heath, Birmingham, we have a 12 hour, 4 room event over 3 stages, featuring a great lineup and a 3am license. Alongside some groundbreaking international artists, we will also be shining a light on some grassroots workshops and inspirational birmingham artists, promoters, bands, djs, vjs, and local orgs, with plenty of ways for everyone of all ages and tastes to get involved with the festivities.

A Live Stage, A Dance Stage, An Acoustic Stage, A programme of workshops, and local stalls will be the main focus of the 12 hour celebration at the award winning Hare & Hounds venue in Kings Heath Birmingham. As always local artists, and local promoters will be the main feature, though this time we’ve invited a few international artists too.

N.B – Here follows a little background on the workshops, so scroll down if you’re more interested in checking the music side of things

Or if you’re looking for how to buy a ticket they are available here – https://www.theticketsellers.co.uk/buy_tickets/events/?id=10007138

At the first event back in 2007, we invited all to get involved by either playing percussion with our Samba guests, decorating a mask and parading in the midnight parade to win some booze, dressing up and interacting with our interactive performers aka The Tourists. A year later, and the percussion parade, and interactive performance is now totally made up of Da’locals, with local organisations, the midnight parade has grown with each big event, and local shops and creatives are hosting stalls, with many friends of the elephant now developing their own creative practices by being more integrally involved with the events in whatever their area of interest is, mainly on the events side and workshops side.

The main addition/difference this time will be the evolution of the mr elephant workshops. The workshops began as decorating card masks, followed by 2 family/all ages welcome days, which featured a range of drop in activities for all ages from mask making and djing to drum skinning and juggling.

We always wanted the workshops to enable the participants where suitable to perform at the events in a more involved way, so we are very happy to say that this will be a part of our 2nd birthday with a range of free workshops open to the local community of all ages. Drumming, Beatboxing, Poi, Vjing, Animation, Mask Decorating, Juggling, and of course poodle making will all feature from 3pm – 7pm in our workshop area from a host of great workshop facilitators, with the masks and poodle making materials available on the evening too.

The poodles have been so well recieved that they will also feature in the performance (another open door for any budding performers, no experience necessary) with all poodles being judged in the midnight mask poodle percussion parade. Masks will also as always be available to decorate (the flip side of the flyers so keep hold of them) with materials (and masks/flyers) being provided for all.

Participants of the animation workshop will see their creations live in the visuals on the nights on either the live or dance stage. Participants of the vj workshop will get the opportunity to capture, and perform live in front of a full audience, with online support after the event, and the drummers will be invited to perform in the midnight parade (providing we can find enough drums), and there will be range of other interactive workshops and demonstrations to give the local community an opportunity to try out these various creative practices, all for free in a grassroots, comfortable and accessible environment.

We are and have always been not for profit collective, and are currently not funded in anyway with all of us involved with the event,( including all workshop providers working for free, with costs of the event at just under £2000.

We have a commitment to keeping the entry fee at the minimum, as want the event to be accessible to as many people as possible so there are some £5 early bird tickets available for people on low income, with the main advance ticket price at £7. As the capacity is around 300 at the hare and hounds, there are only 50 of these available.

Grassroots approach seems to be working though, as we’ve already had already a huge interest from workshop providers and people wanting to get involved with the next event, and we will be applying for our first funding to support another full programme of workshops at the next big mr elephant due for the summer.

This is kind of an elephant experiment and can only work with the support of the local community, so if you do like what you see, please think about passing on the email to 10 friends, and if you are on facebook, we really appreciate inviting as many facebook friends to the event, and/or the group as you have time to click on… Really does make keeping in touch with interested or local people a whole lot easier.

Alongside the workshops (3pm – 7pm folks) there will be stalls from local people from reflexology to local art, sone fine drinks promos courtesy of the hare and hounds, interactive performance from james, dom and the crew, the mr elephant midnight mask poodle parade featuring local percussionists (with prizes for best mask and poodle made), multi projector visuals from Vj Blendstate & The Lab, and a whole lot more….

And of course there’s the music side of things…

LIVE STAGE

Dub Fx – www.dub-fx.net

We are more than excited to have this guy down from Bristol on the 23rd May 2009. He’s one of the best beatbox and loop pedal artists we’ve seen, and just check out his youtube videos for what you can expect. On heavy rotation on the mr elephant radio show, and one of Bass6’s recommendations, Dubfx is an inspiring artist, and we are going to be making a lot of noise about his incredible skills. He has a new album out on May 30th, and his last cd is available from his website… well worth a tenner.

An introduction to what he does (worth watching these through)

Jamming on the street

At Glastonbury Stone Circle

At Glastonbury on stage (Apologies for sound quality)

Alphadrive – www.myspace.com/alphadrive

Our other headliners for the 2009 may bank holiday gig on sat May 23rd, these guys are quickly gaining a reputation for being one of the freshest live dance acts around showcasing “a perfect fusion of danceable dub, breaks and electronica” (Raise the Roof Festival”. Following a string of high profile appearances at UK festivals and club nights, this up-and-coming live trio have supported acts such as: Atomic Hooligan, Beardyman, The Bays, DJ Deekline, Tayo, Rogue Element, Scratch Perverts, and DJ Yoda. Definitly one to watch.

Mike Freears Requim For A Dream Remix

Alphadrive live at Tan Hill

Bass6 (Hosting) - http://www.myspace.com/rhythmandbass

What can we say about the beatboxer Bass6, a true grassroots star in our opinion. With superb hosting skills, a inspiring attitude and a huge range of skills from beatboxing to workshops, this guy really brings the vibes, with his own productions are opening doors all over the country. He hosted our Midnight poodle parade on the beach at Celebrate Brums Underground, and he’s back for our next big event on Sat 23rd May 2009…not to be missed.

Hosting our last mr elephant midnight poodle parade competition

At Global Gathering

Circadia – http://en-gb.facebook.com/pages/Circadia/41719392713

These guys have really come into their own this year, and one of the reasons why we are chuffed that they will be performing at our 2nd birthday. They house a great line up of talented musicians, which include multiskilled instrumentalist Jon Elliot has been one of the percussionists since our 2nd event.

Jam Jah (Djs) – www.friendlyfiremusic.com

A big elephant event wouldnt be complete with out Jam Jah, and they will be hosting the live stage with their fresh conscious reggae music

DANCE STAGE – Hosted by Osmosis!

Osmosis – www.myspace.com/osmosisevents

Osmosis is a a co-operative run by a group of people who are passionate about their music and sharing it with like minded people. Each member of the crew has given their talent, equipment and time freely with any money made being ploughed back in to improve lighting, decor, sound, produce free CDs, and if we’re really lucky, buy us a couple of drinks.

Supported by the vibrant and eclectic venue, Rootys (rip), Osmosis has developed a reputation for it’s atmosphere, music and support of local talent, with names like Paul Damage (1881 Recordings/House of God), Sir Real (House of God) , and Sub Citizen (Resistor Records/Inukshuk) joining Residents and local heroes DK Roon’, Mack, Dr Pepperspray, HijACKER and M-AK.

Jerome Hill – http://www.myspace.com/djjeromehill

A huge techno and breaks artist, and an international legend in his own right, we can’t quite get our hat on that he’s going to be headlining the dance Osmosis stage! Prepare yourselves.

Live at Glade (Apologies for Sound quality)

Scratch Practice

We couldn’t find any footage of their residents aside from the osmosis myspace link, so will be looking for mixes to help promote in the next week or two. Suffice to say Osmonauts need no introduction, and their programming and residents skills are hugely respected in the Birmingham Underground. Osmosis have organised legendary packed out parties from day one, and always attract the friendliest crowd of people you could hope to meet on a night out.This will be their first outing at the hare and hounds, so we look forward to a lot of warmth and phat music on the evening.

The other dj appearing is our own resident Marc Reck who will be playing either swing or a live eclectic set on the main stage, or a big room breaks techno, and drum and bass set on the dance stage. Here’s a recent clip of the end of his gig at the Night Times at the Custard Factory.

Acoustic Stage

Rich Batsford – www.richbatsford.com

A core member of Project X Presents, one of Birmingham’s finest piano players, and all round top bloke, Rich Batsford is one of Birminghams’s musical treasures, and his music has been compared to that of the great steve reich, Keith Jarret, Michael Nyman, Claude Debussy, and Brian Eno. His debut album is currently free to download on his website, and his live performances are not to be missed. Check the valentines day Mr Elephant Radio show for a live recording of a gig from 2007.

Rich Batsford – Namaste

Live at Project X Presents

Laura Louise – www.myspace.com/lauralouiseowen – Hailing from New Zealand, Laura is a huge talent, and somewhat undiscovered on these shores. An amazing voice, and multi instrumentalist, s

This copied from our Mr Elephant Website

We’ve been waiting a while to invite Russ back, and after hearing him on form last night, it was well worth the wait!

The Party Rockin Mammal Sessions have been going really well @ the Bulls Head as a bi monthly thing, so this month we started a monthly residencies (1st Friday of Every Month @ the bulls head, and so to kick us off we had (in our honest opinion), one of the best party rockin’ breaks djs in the midliands, Dj R Caine.

Since winning the pionneer dj comp, he’s gone on to host some big residencies at Archangel, City Breaks, Raw, and the Canal Club, before joining us Rockfall crew back in 2007, and then part of the Drop Beats Events. Russ also played one of the sets of the night at our Celebrate Birmingham’s Underground event on the beach in September last year.

Our resident Vj Blendstate was well on form with his visual multi screen magic, and our resident dj Marc Reck will be playing more of that monkey swing, before launching into the big breaks set, and the big drum & bass & jungle finale. Top Night, and big up to the security who let us end with that memorable finale.

On behalf of the whole elephant crew, we sincerely want to say cheers to any party rockin mammals who’ve been down, and for all the feedback as it has really helped shaped the night.

Next month we have Custom Made Custodian Mark Smallman! – Fri 5th June 2009

Here’s the