Marc Reck

This copied from our Mr Elephant website

A video by Jack Brabant of the Event

A video by The Lab of the start of Marc Reck & Liam Blendstate’s Set

Cinephonic @ the Hare and Hounds from theLAB

This copied from our Mr Elephant Website

Massive elephant noises to everyone who came down and filled the Adam & Eve with appreciative sounds to the great array of talent on show from our 3 special guests this month.

Flame of Fervour were dark, gritty, acoustic with a very cool sound and great musicianship, the flamenco & latin fusion of the Hidden Half ignited a huge response from the audience, and The Heels, once again, set the whole place on fire, with one hour of inspired musicianship, and plenty of crowd pleasing ska….literally a band so large the brass section wouldn’t fit on the stage!

Also very special shouts must also go out to Jack for coming to video, Tony the sound sound man for rockin the last two hours, and Tony from TheLab who came down all the way from Leicester to Vj all night long.

Not only did he perform with an unprepared selection of material (not that we knew til he said!), but he also used footage from the 2nd Birthday made in the kids animation workshop in his vj set!

…plus he also gave 2 workshops to our resident dj Marc Reck, and our guest Paulo Riddle, both of whom got to perform live as a vj on the night! Nice work Tea!

In what is deemed to be Birmingham Music Month, it was refreshing to see so many multi instrumentalists in one room, and experience so much diversity of music, all of which generated a real warm crowd response.

Our resident videographer Jack Brabant, will be posting his video of the evening and we also have more photos taken by Marc on his flickr page here. Marc also recorded some of the audio which will be featured on Mr Elephant radio in our new monday night residency next week on rhubarb radio – 6pm – 8pm, and check out his own set from the night, which was as wonderfully diverse and crowd pleasing as the live music.

For now we’ll leave you with a little footage of the Hidden Half. Our next Live & Free event is on Sat 25th July 2009, and as always it will feature great live music , a range of dancing music, and is free all night long til 4am.

One love

Mr Elephant x

A lot of hard work, but ultimately a great experience

Liam & i have been working on getting an a.v set together all week with 3 am finishes most nights. Hard work but necessary as we were both using new technologies, and obviously wanted the launch to be something special, not least because Quantic was also on the bill (after a chance call from Adam asking if we could fit him and his new film into the night)

What was interesting to learn on a personal note (once again) that pre planned sets aren’t suited to djing. Its was essential that Liam knew exactly what was played so he could create video clips and an av set to accompany (for our first one at least), but we both learnt that there is only so much planning that works in this environment.

After watching the Transition in Tradition filming, Paul our guest percussionist played an inspired solo set while we plugged the cd decks back in (as they were obscuring the screen) and then we launched into our 1st cinephonic set. The set was a real pleasure building up through all kinds of music, from the opening track (Bombay by A R Rahman) through Tipper, Thievery Corporation, Kruder & Dorfmeister, into some funk, swing, and then Quantic style rolling house tracks.

The response was just as i’d hoped up until one of the swing hop tracks. It was here when the dancefloor went from everyone up to some people getting a beer. Normally as a dj you wouldn’t think twice about switching it up or back, into something that works, but as we had a set plan, there was no way out. It was the first time i’d had this experience for a while, and is best accustomed to taking the wrong bag of records out.  I’m always a bit overly critical if the floor doesn’t stay remain full/build up, and people said positive things afterwards, but iwas reminded that some styles of music just work better played end to end.

Reason i say that is because, Quantic and B+ plugged in, and just put on some great records. There was no mixing, just selecting, and the floor responded to the records it liked. For certain styles of music you need to be free to play, and the crowd will groove to the parts they like and that’s what they did. While it was a new experience for me and liam as a partnership, it reminded me that 5 days working out how to fit various genres of more difficult records together is not normally as productive as it can feel. That said there’s nothing that beats a proper dj set using the equipment and scratchig it up in terms of really setting a crowd off.

Nevertheless i have great memories of the night, and feel lucky to have been reminded of something i learnt so long ago. Paul’s Cole’s (free control) percussion was inspiring, and we were also joined by the equally inspiring Tony Coleman from The Lab who not only vjed with Quantic, but also recorded the whole set, and has even edited and uploaded a section while the rest flies its way over via carrier postmen.

I’ll be posting the full audio and hopefully sections of video as soon as it arrives, and i’ll leave you with the opening 10 minutes of our Av set courtesy of  Tea.

Cinephonic @ the Hare and Hounds from theLAB on Vimeo.

I’ll post the audio once it arrives (or feature it as part of our new Mr Elephant Radio show every monday night from June 29th on www.rhubarbradio.com – plug plug : )) but for now here’s the tracklisting

Cinephonic Av Set #1 – Marc Reck & Vj Blendstate

1. Bombay – A.R Rahman

2. Biotech – Tabla Beat Science

3. Speechless – Count Basic

4. Cat People – Amon Tobin

5. Dead Pixels – Tipper

6. Bug Powder Dust (Kruder Mix) – Bomb The Bass

7. Lebonese Blond – Thievery Corporation.

8. The State of The Union – Thievery Corporation

9. Life In the Rain – Quantic

10. Bitte Drehn – Dublex Inc

11. Enter the Haggis – The Haggis Horns

12. Magic Afternoon – Parov Stellar

13. Wanna Go Home – Angry Rabbit Productions

14. 34 – Angry Rabbit Productions

15. Zuzukus People – Up Bustle & Out

16. Get A Move On – Mr Scruff

17. Belleville Rendevous – Ben Charest

18. Hip Hip Chin Chin (Maxim Illion Mix) – Club Del Belugas

19. A Pomba Girou – Zero Db

20 Sabor Feat Tempo – Quantic

21. On the One Three – Zero Db

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
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

For a while now i’ve been wanting to create and tour a proper dj/vj set with narrative and performance, and while we’ve had a few outings and opportunities, we’ve only really scratched the surface.

Alonside the music productions, the first attempt from a dj perspective was my fear and love mixtape back in 2006. Then the Mr Elephant mixtapes in 2007, and the opening of the que club set. At the big project x presents shows, i had the opportunity to work on multi-media sets working with the themes of the heroes journey, and digital distopia, and for the peace not war event at Drop Beats Not Bombs i got the opportunity to collaborate with bham dance collective, lisa wetton, and vj chromatouch, to create a narrative about war. All of which has inspired further collaborative projects, and taught new approaches into creating something which has the spotanaity of djing and vjing, and the structure of narrative.

With all the projects, proposals, and website developing, i’ve been feelin far away from the creative side of life, so i was most chuffed to have an inspiring hour long facebook chat with The Lab’s very own Tony Coleman today. His name sounds like a sports broadcaster, but he is in fact, one of the most innovative vjs in the uk, currently touring resident with Edirol and Cream…a top bloke with bags of creativity to boot.

We first met at the Project X Presents, when Leon Trimble drafted in his a list of vjs for the 3rd big project x presents show. We hit it off through a shared love of breaks, and an interest in political issues, and innovative use of djing, vjing and new technology.

Next connection was at a recent Plaza 2008 show, where Tone used my journey to the edge of somewhere mix to demonstrate his vjing with new edirol products, and since then we’ve spoke about taking something on the road. We’ve both been made masks, and like the idea of dj and vj being part of the performance, so this should see a lot more integration on that side of things. There’s also talk of playing a visual harp, and using a whole host of technology on both the audio and visual side.

Well now, (after that facebook chat!?) we’ve got a beginning and hopefully a more defined end in which to start basing the middle around. The theme is based on that speech in Network, Zeitgeist, Bill Hicks, and it ties in with the proposed Share to Create ethos, and forthcoming Z day on March 15th, though with Tony’s forthcoming german tour,  and our current commitments, we’re approaching it as an ongoing project set for the summer.

Inspired by X, Exploring the Y, to get to the Z.