Tag Archives: Kino Teatre

Live review: Trevor Moss & Hannah-Lou at Kino Teatre, St Leonards 14/6/19

Folk music, Hastings music scene, Live reviews, , , , , , ,

Tonight’s Kino event with Trevor Moss & Hannah Lou is actually a three-parter: not only a full set from St Leonards’ own nationally-acclaimed indie-folk duo playing on home turf as well as support from another talented local singer-songwriter, Hayley Savage, but also a screening of Trevor Moss’s own film ‘Live In Store’ that documents the duo’s nationwide tour of in-store appearances at independent record shops in support of their album Fair Lady London at the end of last year.

We start with the latter. Moss explains that as a record of the tour the film is inspired by the rough and ready footage of childhood celebrations on his parents’ Super 8 film camera. Shot in black and white the effect is like moody atmospheric arthouse cinema meets shaky pre-VHS, pre-digital family film-show. As a film genre Moss pulls it off brilliantly. And as their couple’s young toddler son also accompanies them on many of their travels the style seems somehow wholly appropriate. Motorways, record stores, Travel Lodges, local radio studios and repeat and repeat – the film captures the humdrum rhythm and repetitiveness of days spent touring but interspersed with the magic that is live performance as they play their songs to appreciative punters between the record and CD racks. As Moss states in the closing credits lets hope such places continue to remain a feature of everyday life rather than a strange curiosity from the past.

Hayley Savage’s brand of folky Americana works for me, for sure. A heartfelt singer songwriter, a lovely warm sound from her semi acoustic guitar that lends itself perfectly to the material and superb backing from her band (Ruby Colley, Lizzie Raffiti and Victoria Howarth) I’d certainly be keen to catch these again.

After seeing Trevor Moss & Hannah Lou ply their wares and play their songs in one record store after another in the earlier film, it’s perhaps a bit of a novelty seeing those songs being performed live on a proper stage in the altogether grander surroundings of the Kino Teatre’s domed auditorium. The duo’s performance loses none of its intimacy though – either with one another or with us the audience. There’s plenty of songs from the recent album Fair Lady London, including beautiful renditions of ‘We Should’ve Gone Dancing’, ‘Everything You Need’ and ‘I Could Break You’ together with a smattering of older material. The voices, the guitars, the lyrics, the vintage keyboards – pretty much every component of Trevor Moss & Hannah-Lou act as a duo blends to perfection.

http://www.trevormossandhannahlou.com/

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Previous reviews:

Album review – Fair Lady London

Record Store Day 2017

Live review: Kevin Armstrong at the Kino, St Leonards 15/2/18

Hastings music scene, Live reviews, Music culture & history, Rock music, , , , , ,

This review was originally published by The Stinger here

Kevin Armstrong’s guitar playing has accompanied stars including David Bowie, Iggy Pop, Morrissey, Prefab Sprout, Sinéad O’Connor, Roy Orbison, Brian Eno, Grace Jones, Paul McCartney and Gil Evans. For one night only Kevin guides us through his legendary career.

As a child Kevin Armstrong grew up with Beatlemania. By his teens he was buying his first guitar and living and breathing music. Experiencing life as a professional musician in the post-punk scene of the late 70s/early 80s he then found himself in a band that suddenly got dropped by their record label and, looking around at the changed Duran Duran/Spandau Ballet era-music scene, it became, in Armstrong’s words, “all c*nts in suits singing about their holidays.”

A new opportunity arose, however, when Armstrong was ushered in to Abbey Road studios to do a session to find out he would be working with David Bowie on songs for the Absolute Beginners film. Although the film would be critically panned on release, the title track was a commercial success and, importantly, got Armstrong noticed by Bowie as a musician he could work with and was asked to put a band together for Bowie’s Live Aid appearance. Breaking from his easy chat tonight, Armstrong reads out a passage describing in detail the emotions running through his head on that momentous day. Highlighting Bowie’s generosity, Armstrong talks of him taking the trouble to introduce each member of his band on stage at Wembley that day, knowing full well the impact it would have on their careers; as well as personally thanking Armstrong for the role he played in putting the band together in interviews afterwards.

In spite of being a Beatles fan Armstrong’s collaborations with Paul McCartney proved less personally rewarding, however. “We had to sit around all day listening to these very long Beatles anecdotes that never seemed to have a punchline,” he reveals to tonight’s audience, emphasising the importance of a personal spark in a relationship for a musical collaboration to really work.

What did turn out to be a very enduring collaboration though was when Armstrong was invited to play guitar on the Bowie-produced Iggy Pop album Blah Blah Blah and to subsequently tour with him. That musical collaboration was rekindled in recent years with Armstrong putting a band together and touring with Iggy once more. There are many amusing anecdotes this evening but one of the funniest is Armstrong’s description of the metamorphosis that the normally urbane, well-spoken James Osterberg goes through in the hours leading up to a show as he transforms into the crazed madman called Iggy Pop.

Armstrong is one of rock’s archetypal great side-men, a musician with that instinctive feel for what the headline artist needs and delivering it with style and creativity rather than ego and me-too-ism. By way of illustration, he plays us a clip from the Tin Machine tour that Armstrong was briefly involved with, which was the sound of every musician on stage competing against one another in a wall of noise and pretty much drowning Bowie out completely.

I’ve seen many of these type of artist talk events over the years. But with a mix of live songs, film clips, spoken passages and lots of relaxed informal chat this was genuinely one of the most thought-provoking, funny and insightful that I’ve experienced. Gavin Martin (renowned former NME journalist and now music editor for the Daily Mirror and himself, like Armstrong, a local Hastings resident) is a skilled operator at teasing out revealing nuggets from his on-stage guests at events like this. But he hardly needs to say a word as host this evening. I was surprised afterwards that this was Armstrong’s first ever gig of this type. However, if it was a case of starting out with a friendly home crowd he has absolutely nothing to worry about in taking this format elsewhere. An evening with Kevin Armstrong like this is going to be well-received by audiences wherever.

http://www.kevin-armstrong.com/

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Photo: artist publicity

Related review:
Mike Garson performs Aladdin Sane at Birmingham O2 2017

Talking Musical Revolutions with Zoë Howe at Kino-Teatre, St Leonards 24/11/16

Book reviews, Hastings music scene, Music culture & history, Rock music, , , , , , , ,

My review was originally published on The Stinger independent music website here

Rock writer, Zoë  Howe, who has produced acclaimed biographies on the likes of The Slits, The Jesus And Mary Chain, Wilko Johnson, Lee Brilleaux and Stevie Nicks, dropped in at St Leonard’s’ Kino Teatre on Thursday to talk about her experiences writing those; and also about her latest book, Shine On Marquee Moon, her first work of fiction.

Shine On Marquee Moon, named after the iconic Television album, follows the adventures of a fictional 80s new romantic band, Concierge, who are enjoying something of a modern-day revival.In spite of owning up to getting Falco’s “Rock Me Amadeus” as the first ever single she bought with her own money (which she played us the video of, along with Duran Duran’s ‘The Reflex’) this is less Howe’s world than the rock world she knows far more intimately, both as a writer and a performer.

She explained that although she started out with a rock band in mind, she switched genre’s because she “didn’t want it to become too Spinal Tap.”

From the couple of readings she gives us tonight, however, it’s brilliantly observed, hilariously eccentric and caustically witty, yet at the same time it comes across as a very human and empathetic portrayal, too.

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And when Howe moves on to talk about her rock biographies, it’s abundantly clear how precious to her maintaining that human element is.

Drawn to bands like The Who at an impossibly young age, Howe reveals that the first rock biography she ever read was a sordid hatchet job on Keith Moon.

She denies that she consciously set out to do this when I put the question to her later on, but that lurid account could almost have acted as her personal manifesto on how not to do it when it came to working on her own music biographies years later.

She emphasises the importance she attaches to giving her subjects a degree of dignity and respect, as well as love she’s keen to stress, regardless of whatever bizarre rock star behaviour or low points in people’s personal lives her books inevitably touch on.

Howe seems to have taken a Punk DIY ‘just get on and do it’ approach to writing: experimenting and learning as she goes along, rather than bending over backwards to fit the usual constraints of the publishing industry. And it certainly seems to be paying off.

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Talking Musical Revolutions makes for a fascinating evening and with some thought-provoking questions from interviewer, Gavin Martin, a great selection of video clips (The Who, The Slits, Bauhaus and Dr Feelgood, for example – not just Falco and Duran Duran!) and some highly entertaining readings from her new book, the two hours just fly by.

Whether it’s her rock biographies or her new foray into the word of fiction, it’s clear that Zoë Howe deals with her subject matter with warmth, passion and good humour.

And at least one or two of those publications are likely to find their way on to my Christmas present wish-list this year.

http://www.zoehowe.com/

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Photo from event publicity promo

 

Dom Pipkin at Kino-Teatre, St Leonards 8/7/16

Hastings music scene, Live reviews, Rock music, , , , , , ,

My review originally appeared in the Hastings Independent 22/7/16

With its shopfront facade and trendy gallery-cum-foyer you could be forgiven for thinking there’s something nice but not particularly unique about St Leonards Kino Teatre; but step inside the main auditorium and you are immediately transported into a beautiful dome-ceilinged 1913 cinema that’s been given a pleasing shabby-chic makeover. Just for tonight, however, it’s transformed into a legendary New Orleans piano bar with Dom Pipkin (“piano from London, soul from New Orleans” as his website has it) giving a captivating solo performance of high-octane rhythm and blues piano.

After support from Chasing Shadows, a vocal-guitar duo with an engaging acoustic set of Americana-tinged covers and originals, Pipkin takes the stage and begins a whirlwind tour of New Orleans classics; name-checking the likes of Professor Longhair, Jellyroll Morton, Fats Domino and Dr John.

Playing blues and jazz from the age of 12 Dom Pipkin has now established himself as one of Europe’s top interpreters of New Orleans piano and has built up an impressive musical CV. Past collaborations include projects with Ray Davies, Palamo Faith and Talking Heads’ David Byrne. As well as solo shows, he also performs regularly with his own band Dom and the Ikos, but tonight it’s just Dom and his piano. He combines powerfully dexterous piano playing with a nicely empathetic vocal delivery that suits a range of styles and assists in making the songs his own, whether it’s pounding rhythm and blues, elaborate jazz or soulful gospel.

On top of the obvious well-known classics like Blueberry Hill, Ain’t That A Shame and Iko Iko together with some less well-known historical gems from the New Orleans jazz and blues scene, we also get some real surprises, too. Chas and Dave’s Ain’t No Pleasing You is transported from the east-end boozers and re-imagined as a stomping New Orleans boogie woogie. Cottonfields, which let’s be honest most of us only know via the Beach Boys, is taken right back to its glorious Lead Belly blues heritage. Pipkin is also happy to share his knowledge of the songs and their origins and I certainly came out knowing a lot more about the history of the New Orleans scene and its colourful characters than when I went in.

A talented, energetic performer with an obvious deep love of his subject matter and respect for its history, Dom Pipkin and his piano make for a hugely entertaining evening.

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