Silent night: The empty York Theatre Royal stage and auditorium bathed in “emergency red” on the nationwide #LightItInRed campaign night on July 6
YORK Theatre Royal is to make “some redundancies”, faced by the need to reduce costs significantly in the Coronavirus blight.
A statement headlined “York Theatre Royal takes steps to ensure its future” was released today, announcing that, “like so many theatres around the country”, the St Leonard’s Place theatre would be entering into consultations with staff that would “regrettably lead to some redundancies due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic”.
“The theatre has been unable to open its doors for performances since March 17 and, despite Government allowing the return of socially distanced performances from August 1, the theatre’s survival will depend on it reducing costs significantly,” the statement continued.
Eighty-nine per cent of the Theatre Royal’s annual income is generated through ticket sales and from revenue streams associated with welcoming audiences. A £196,493 grant from the Arts Council England Emergency Fund, announced on July 7, will support the theatre, but only to September 30, and crucially details are yet to be announced as to how the much vaunted £1.57 billion Government relief package for cultural institutions will be distributed.
The “crown jewels” of British culture are expected to be at the top of the pecking order, although Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden has talked of the need to protect small-scale theatre enterprises too.
York Theatre Royal executive director Tom Bird, pictured in happier times. “It is devastating to me that in the coming weeks we are going to have to make some very difficult decisions,” he says
In the statement, Theatre Royal executive director Tom Bird said: “Since 1744, the people of York have enjoyed, supported and celebrated this theatre. It is our job, as custodians of this great community asset, to do whatever we can to ensure its survival for the people of our city.
“All of the leadership team have taken big pay cuts, and we have maximised our use of government [furlough] schemes.
“It is devastating to me that in the coming weeks we are going to have to make some very difficult decisions. But the theatre can survive this and we will make sure that, when we are able to re-open our doors, York Theatre Royal will come roaring back with an epic programme to help re-energise our community’s creativity.”
Tom added: “I want to take this opportunity to thank the hundreds of people who are donating to the theatre at this time, as a result of our heightened fundraising messages. This is making a real difference.” Donations can be made online via yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Vicky Biles, the Theatre Royal director of communications and development, said: “We’re not going to add anything else at this time.”
That leaves questions aplenty. How many redundancies? When will the Theatre Royal learn if any slice of the £1.57 billion aid package is bound for York? Will Cinderella still be going to the ball in the Theatre Royal’s first pantomime collaboration with Evolution Productions from December 4 to January 10 2021? Watch this space for the answers, whenever they may come.
Artistic director Marianne McNamara and producer Pete Toon at Mikron Theatre Company’s last performance in 2019. Picture: Mark Kelly
MIKRON Theatre Company have shot past their fundraising target to secure next year’s 50th anniversary tour in less than three weeks.
After the Covid curse de-railed their entire 2020 season, the West Yorkshire travelling troupe needed to raise £48,337.49 to continue taking shows not only on the road but on canals and rivers too.
The brisk financial fillip supplied by supporters and the public at large, both home and abroad, means the Marsden company now can plan their 2021 travels aboard their 1936 narrowboat Tyseley.
“We cannot thank people enough,” says buoyant artistic director Marianne McNamara. “We are absolutely humbled by the support we have received. It is testament to not only how valued the company is, but also to the work we have done for the past 50 years.
“We’ve had letters and emails from all over the world: Texas, Catalonia and the Netherlands and, of course, every corner of the country from Cornwall to Cromarty, saying how much Mikron means to them and that they couldn’t see us miss out on our 50th year of touring.”
What happens next? “Every penny raised over the minimum amount we needed for the appeal will, of course, be used wisely and carefully,” says Marianne. “We have Tyseley, our narrowboat, to keep ship shape, and we will be able to continue our aims of developing new writers, directors and creatives for the future of Mikron and the industry as a whole.”
Based at the Mechanics Hall in the village of Marsden, at the foot of the Yorkshire Pennines, Mikron Theatre Company tour shows to “places that other theatre companies wouldn’t dream of”, be it a play about growing-your-own staged at allotments; a play abuzz with bees performed next to hives; or one about when the chips are down, served up in a fish and chip restaurant.
Game on! Amanda Whittington’s football play, Atalanta Forever, WILL be staged by Mikron Theatre Company next year
Or a play about hostelling that spent nights at YHA youth hostels and one telling the story of the RNLI, launched at several lifeboat stations around the UK coastline.
The successful appeal ensures 2020’s Covid-cancelled shows can go ahead in 2021: Amanda Whittington’s new work on women’s football in the 1920s, Atalanta Forever, and the premiere of Polly Hollman’s canine comedy caper A Dog’s Tale.
In 48 years until this year’s enforced hibernation, Mikron have performed 64 original shows; composed and written 384 songs; issued 236 actor-musician contracts; spent 30,000 boating hours on the inland waterways; covered 530,000 road miles; performed 5,060 times and played to 428,000 people.
For further information on Mikron Theatre Company and the opportunity to donate, visit mikron.org.uk/appeal.
Joseph Rowntree Theatre volunteering director Barbara Boyce models one of her face masks in aid of the Raise The Roof appeal
SALES of jazzy face masks designed by volunteering director Barbara Boyce have raised more than £850 for the Joseph Rowntree Theatre roof appeal in York.
Early on in lockdown, before the wearing of masks or facial coverings became commonplace or, in some places, mandatory, Barbara began making and selling fabric face masks for the Raise The Roof appeal.
Board trustee Barbara bought and donated all the fabric and elastic for the masks, joining the JoRo’s Just Giving campaign with her fundraiser over the past two months.
“I am making these fun face masks to brighten up those occasions when people need to wear them. They come in a huge variety of high-quality fabrics featuring animals, florals and quirky prints,” she says.
Leaves or carrots? Two of the masks available from Barbara Boyce to boost the Joseph Rowntree Theatre appeal for roof repairs
Now that mask-wearing is to become compulsory in shops, with effect from July 24, Barbara anticipates continued – and hopefully increased – demand for the snazzy masks and in turn a further boost for the £90,000 appeal.
Barbara is asking for a minimum donation of £8 for each mask and buyers can contact her to choose a design and size via justgiving.com/fundraising/barbara-boyce1, with her masks available in adult and child sizes.
“All our usual income has dried up as no-one is able to hire the theatre at the moment,” she says. “We still need to pay our bills and get the roof repaired.
“So far I’ve made over 100 masks and as long as people keep buying, I’ll keep sewing.”
Spring a surprise: Laura Marling hatched her seventh album earlier than first planned
Laura Marling, Song For Our Daughter (Chrysalis Records/Partisan) ****
LAURA Marling’s style is elegance personified, that distinctive voice flouting over a summery backing.
For this record, the production is more expansive, but never immodestly. This album, her seventh, is written to an imaginary daughter, but not in the crib-style of Jackie Oates’ Lullabies.
Held Down is a frank song about power and relationships, and probably not for pass-the-parcel playlists. The songwriter has described Song For Our Daughter as “a rumination on modern femininity”, and the spaces in between the words leaves plenty of room for interpretation. This is a record to close around you like a hug. It’s not stifling; 36 minutes and you are done.
Most distinctive, and probably the soonest to pall, is Strange Girl, swept along on a Latin riff and a naggingly good chorus. Marling sounds in control, even when singing about the opposite, and Joni Mitchell remains the closest comparison.
You sense Marling stretching out, but nimbly rather than dramatically, astute enough to move forward at a pace her audience can live with. The strong arrangements are tastefully done and beautifully recorded.
If Only The Strong Survives is becalmed, the message is irrefutable: Marling is in this for the long run. No histrionics or Penderecki. Blow By Blow’s stark piano beauty sees the singer chasing a kind of Blue, and was inspired by Paul McCartney. The aura of Leonard Cohen hovers near the opening Alexandra.
Like the wonderful Bedouine, Song For Our Daughter is calming and mellifluous, a summer brook, but dip below the jewelled surface and the temperature soon drops. Hope We Meet Again is particularly effective, this time half spoken, while For You ends happily, the sort of coda that Nilsson might have once conceived.
Review by Paul Rhodes
Only One Question for Laura Marling…
Why did you speed-release Song For Our Daughter in lockdown “ahead of our planned schedule”?
“IN light of the change to all our circumstances, I saw no reason to hold back on something that, at the very least, might entertain, and at its best, provide some sense of union,” says Laura.
“It’s strange to watch the facade of our daily lives dissolve away, leaving only the essentials; those we love and our worry for them.
“An album, stripped of everything that modernity and ownership does to it, is essentially a piece of me, and I’d like for you to have it. I’d like for you, perhaps, to hear a strange story about the fragmentary, nonsensical experience of trauma and an enduring quest to understand what it is to be a woman in this society.
“When I listen back to it now, it makes more sense to me then when I wrote it. My writing, as ever, was months, years, in front of my conscious mind. It was there all along, guiding me gently through the chaos of living. And that, in itself, describes the sentiment of the album – how would I guide my daughter, arm her and prepare her for life and all of its nuance?
“I’m older now, old enough to have a daughter of my own, and I feel acutely the responsibility to defend The Girl. The Girl that might be lost, torn from innocence prematurely or unwittingly fragmented by forces that dominate society. I want to stand behind her and whisper in her ear all the confidences and affirmations I had found so difficult to provide myself. This album is that strange whisper; a little distorted, a little out of sequence, such is life.
THERE is something deeply satisfying when an artist long missing in action re-appears with great songs.
Badly Drawn Boy, Damon Gough to his mum and bank manager, was always an interesting character. His anti-rock star demeanour contrasted with his early success.
Like Elliot Smith, here was a songwriter that didn’t fit the commercial juggernaut. There were always flashes, like Space Between Your Ears from his 2012 soundtrack to Being Flynn.
After a decade-long hiatus, Gough re-emerges at 50 with a fistful of tunes that are at once familiar but cleverly good. He has always had a flair with melody; it rarely goes where you think it is heading.
The life knocks he’s endured – it transpires he hasn’t been sitting in a pool lapping up adoration all these years – have given him a rich vein of material to write about, and there’s a more direct edge to the lyrics. Looking over his shoulder at the exit, I Just Want To Wish You Happiness is affecting, while I’ll Do My Best ushers Gough into a new relationship.
Badly Drawn Boy: “A fistful of tunes that are at once familiar but cleverly good”
Fortunate, too, that Gough has not sunk into tuneless gloom. On the contrary, I’m Not Sure What It Is features a glorious Technicolor production, full of sunlight and hard-won wisdom. Rightly, Like Tony Wilson Says has been singled out for praise and may yet be a hit. Taking a Manchester cultural icon, Tony Wilson, and his Hacienda nightclub, it’s an uplifting tribute that even seems to have left space for the crowd’s roar.
You can never tell whether Gough is being ironic, but it does seem that he is now foot-sure about which musical path to pursue. As he told the Guardian, this record presents “a more focused version of what I’ve tried to achieve in the past”.
Fly On The Wall captures Gough’s worldview to perfection, married to another joyous melody that both harks back and looks more hopefully ahead to what tomorrow brings.
Compared with these heights, the quality does ebb in the middle. For example, Colours feels dated and the Eighties touches are overdone, but these slips are few and the overall upbeat mood makes for the pleasing contrast to the pallor of our economic sky. Definitely Gough’s best record since his debut, the Mercury Prize-winning The Hour Of Bewilderbeast, 20 years ago.
York Philharmonic Male Voice Choir and Ryedale Voices members recording Keep Singing via Zoom
YORK Philharmonic Male Voice Choir and Malton’s Ryedale Voices are uniting for a Virtual Summer Concert online on July 25.
Raising funds for the Trussell Trust through donations, the 7.30pm concert will be live-streamed on YouTube, hosted by Richard Kay, who has been leading rehearsals over Zoom since lockdown began.
“It will feature around 20 choral pieces and smaller collaborations, compiled from around 350 individual recordings made by 60 members of the two choirs,” says Richard, the Phil’s assistant musical director and Ryedale choir’s conductor.
Richard Kay: Leading rehearsals on Zoom
“Several songs have been learned during lockdown and so have never before been performed by these choirs, including three brand new compositions that have never yet been performed by singers in the same room!”
Already in lockdown, the Phil and Ryedale Voices have made a virtual choir recording of Keep Singing, attracting more than 1,200 views online.
Artist Ails McGee: Picking up her brushes anew in lockdown
RETURN of the Mc could not have gone better for Ails McGee, whose “comeback” exhibition at According To McGee sold out at yesterday’s launch in York.
Gallery co-director Ails unveiled Return Of The Painter: The Sea, The Sky, The City from midday to 4pm as the ebullient Tower Street art space welcomed browsers for the first time since the Covid-enforced shutdown on March 23.
“Thanks to everyone who came today,” Ails and fellow director Greg McGee tweeted afterwards. “The paintings of @AilsMcGee connected with collectors and are now sold out. She is taking commissions and is preparing for the next group exhibition. We open next Saturday. Come see us!”
Ahead of the launch, Ails said: “This is our 16th year anniversary, and we had innovative plans with big innovative events to celebrate. Performances, installations, digitally illuminated projections: it was an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink approach, but all of that was kicked into the long grass in March. Since then, I’ve gone back to the drawing board, so to speak.”
So much so, Ails has picked up her paint brushes again, in part inspired to do so by “parsimonious proposals from politicians on essential exercise”.
“I remember thinking while I was alone in the middle of Rowntree Park at midday, there were certain people who would have reported me to the police,” she says. “It was a hard time to go outside and watch the season change. I don’t have much memory of seeing the cherry blossom this year as it was a complicated thing just to go outside and enjoy nature. So, I thought to myself, if I can’t experience the real thing, why not paint it?”
Before establishing the According To McGee gallery with her husband and business partner Greg McGee in 2004, Ails was a successful painter, exhibiting in her native Kelso in the Scottish Borders and around Yorkshire.
Ails and Greg McGee after the successful launch of Ails’s Return Of The Painter show as According To McGee re-opened.yesterday afternoon
Her painterly arc flattened with the arrival of children – “three under three years old at one point,” she says – and her forays into charity work and The Artillery art enterprise. Now, however, the arid aspects of Covid have helped Ails focus on how important painting is to her.
“It’s everything. It forces you to see more clearly and, though it can be frustrating trying to harness what you see – all those shades, curves and colours – it’s the mixture of poetry, prophecy and religion that is so empowering and addictive,” she says.
Painting in lockdown has been “very liberating” as Ails built on her experiences of nature in the Borders, this time basing her compositions on the visual power and bitter beauty of the North East coast.
“It’s funny, seascapes come with the unfair caveat that they’re twee and calming, but it’s the opposite of that which intoxicates me and which I hope I am beginning to harness in my paintings,” she says. “The sea can be savage and changeful, on the point of bursting into full bloom, but in a painting it’s rarely twee.”
Bringing her new seascape collection to the commercial market after her hiatus does not unnerve Ails, “It’s the perfect time,” she argues. “I’m in good company: Freya Horsely and David Baumforth are internationally well-regarded masters of their craft in this field and, to be honest, I’ve already made some pre-exhibition sales.
“So, I’m in a very fortunate position. I’m producing paintings, I get to hang them in my gallery, and I’m selling them to collectors who enjoy the visuals of a sea in constant change.”
The difficulties of running a gallery under the shadow of Covid are surmountable, reckons Ails. “We’re launching with a day-long happening,” she said before yesterday’s event. “The gallery won’t be too busy at any given point, we have the attendant sanitisers, and we’re happy to welcome anyone who wants to come: old friends, artists, clients, collectors, new collectors,” she says. “Quarantine has cut culture short for too long. We can’t wait to get back in the groove.”
“It should be a really fun thing to do. We’re hoping people get dressed up, get creative and get dancing!” says VOXED artistic director Wayne Parsons, introducing the #Goggledance project
THE Stephen Joseph Theatre and dance storytellers VOXED are uniting for an innovative new project in Scarborough.
They are inviting residents of the East Coast resort’s Eastfield area to bid to take part in #goggledance, a co-production wherein participants will watch a dance performance taking place outside their own homes, while filming themselves watching – and joining in.
Their footage will be incorporated into a series of short films that will include professional footage of the performance too.
The films will be posted online and on social media by both VOXED and the SJT over several weeks in the autumn.
The project is the brainchild of choreographer and director Wayne Parsons, the founder of VOXED, formerly Wayne Parsons Dance.
“We’ll be staging five live performances right outside people’s homes in Eastfield: a personalised show for that household and their neighbours,” he says.
“At an agreed time, we’ll turn up on their street and a solo dancer will perform a ten-minute piece. The live performance will be in three sections: Watch Us, Follow Me and finally a Be You section.
“All they need to do is record themselves during the show – on a mobile phone will be fine. They then send us their film and we’ll create short videos combining our performance with their homemade films that can be shared online.”
Wayne adds: “Everyone that applies will be included, even if they’re not selected as one of the final five. Everyone will be sent a short dance to learn that has a moment at the end where each household can showcase their creative sides. These submissions will then be included in our digital distribution, using the hashtag #goggledanceus”
“It should be a really fun thing to do. We’re hoping people get dressed up, get creative and get dancing! The idea is to get loads of people having a boogie and sharing with their local community and their local theatre. They’ll be able to showcase their talents for the world!”
SJT artistic director, Paul Robinson, says: “When Wayne first came to us with the idea for #goggledance, we knew we couldn’t say no! It’s one of the most innovative, inclusive and exciting dance projects we’ve seen in a long time. We’re delighted to be able to bring it to Scarborough.”
If you want to take part in #goggledance, email goggledance@sjt.uk.com by Saturday, August 8. Please include a short video introduction to you, your family and anyone else who will be there on filming day, plus the view from the window from where you will be watching and the room that you will be in.
“It’s not essential, but if you have a talent, whether it’s dancing, singing or playing a musical instrument, include it in your video submission,” advises Wayne.
Live performances will take place on August 22 and the films will be available online on the VOXED and SJT Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and Tik Tok accounts.
VOXED artistic director Wayne Parsons is a director, choreographer and movement director with more than 15 years’ experience of working in dance and theatre.
He graduated from London Contemporary Dance School before embarking on a performance career that spanned 13 years, working for Sydney Dance Company, Richard Alston Dance Company and the National Dance Company of Wales.
As a choreographer, Wayne regularly makes for his own company VOXED, formerly Wayne Parsons Dance, touring work across the UK and abroad. In theatre, he has choreographed shows at Shakespeare’s Globe, Theatre Royal Stratford East and Hampstead Theatre.
“VOXED creates work that is, at its heart, all about storytelling,” he says. “Our aim is to bring people together through the shared experience of dance. Whether it be through our indoor work, our outdoor work or our participation projects, we aim to reflect the world we live in and the stories we share through the work we do.”
CULTURE Secretary Oliver Dowden is on the case, he says, making plans for the gradual re-opening of theatres, comedy joints and music venues, when Covid-safe to do so, but the traffic lights are still stuck at red.
Outdoor performances were given the thumbs-up to resume from last Saturday, not so helpfully at two days’ notice, and cinemas are pencilling in a re-start from July 31, although nothing is confirmed yet. Meanwhile, assorted summer festivals are going virtual, as did this week’s Great Yorkshire Show.
This masked-up column will steer clear of the pubs, bars, restaurants and shops making their welcome comebacks, focusing instead on what’s going on…or not going on, as CHARLES HUTCHINSON reports
Violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen: RyeStream concert on July 25
RyeStream, Ryedale Festival online, July 19 to 26
THE 2020 Ryedale Festival has transmuted into RyeStream, an online festival of eight concerts, streamed straight to your home daily over the course of a week.
Musicians are making the journey to North Yorkshire to perform in three empty but beautiful locations: All Saints’ Church, Helmsley, St Michael’s Church, Coxwold, and the triple whammy of the Long Gallery, Chapel and Great Hall at Castle Howard.
Taking part will be Isata Kanneh-Mason, piano, July 19, 3pm; Rachel Podger, violin, July 20, 11am; Matthew Hunt, clarinet, and Tim Horton, piano, July 21, 1pm; Anna Hopwood, organ, July 22, 11am; Abel Selaocoe, cello, July 23, 6pm; Rowan Pierce, soprano, and Christopher Glynn, piano, July 24, 9pm; Tamsin Waley-Cohen, violin, and Christopher Glynn, piano, July 25, 3pm, and Carducci Quartet and Streetwise Opera, July 26, 6pm.
Go to ryedalefestival.com/ryestream/ for instructions on how to view. This debut online season is free, although donations are welcome.
Staithes Blue, acrylic on canvas, by Giuliana Lazzerini at Blue Tree Gallery
New exhibition of the week: Giuliana Lazzerini: Solo, Blue Tree Gallery, York
BLUE Tree Gallery artist in residence Giuliana Lazzerini has opened an exhibition of new acrylic work online and at the York art-space for viewing by appointment only.
The Bootham gallery is “not fully open as yet”, but Covid-safety measures are in place, enabling viewing appointments to be made for Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays until August 5. To book one, send an email to bluetreegallery@hotmail.co.uk.
Owner Terry Brett outside Pyramid Gallery, in Stonegate, York
Gallery re-opening part two: Pyramid Gallery, York
TERRY Brett’s Pyramid Gallery, in Stonegate, York, has re-opened, operating a two-fold system for visitors.
You can book a 30-minute slot to browse the gallery at your leisure at pyramidgallery.com/ or, alternatively, if there is a sign up saying Please Knock To Enter, knock on the door and either Terry or Fi or Sarah will invite you in, one group at a time, and lock the door behind you.
“If the lights are not on, the shop is closed that day,” says Terry. “We will not be open on Sundays.”
Bootiful: Harrogate artist Anita Bowerman with her Tree of Life installation at Castle Howard for York Cancer Research’s Give It Some Welly fundraising campaign
Art installation of the week: Anita Bowerman’s Give Cancer The Boot, Castle Howard grounds
HARROGATE artist Anita Bowerman has designed a Tree of Life installation, Give Cancer The Boot, for Yorkshire Cancer Research’s Give It Some Welly fundraising campaign.
Hanging from a fir tree by the Atlas Fountain on the South Front, glistening in the sun like a summer variation on Christmas decorations, are 191 hand-polished stainless-steel wellies embossed with the YCR’s rose.
Why 191? They represent the 191,000 Yorkshire people who have “given the cancer the boot” over the past 25 years or live with it. To see the wellies, you will need to book a visit to Castle Howard at castlehoward.co.uk.
Oh, you are Orpheus: Storyteller Alexander Flanagan-Wright and minstrel Phil Grainger await your invitation
Outdoor theatre show of the summer: Orpheus, The Flanagan Collective/Gobbledigook Theatre
LIVE theatre is back, all over North Yorkshire, at your invitation. Step forward York theatre-makers Alexander Flanagan-Wright and Phil Grainger, who are mounting a five-pronged art attack under the banner I’ll Try And See You Sometimes.
Among their analogue enterprises is Orpheus – A Hyper Local Tour. “We’re taking Orpheus on an outdoor tour around North Yorkshire’s local lanes, villages, and towns, performing with social distancing in place and abiding by Government guidelines on how many people can meet at any one time,” says Alex.
“The shows can take place on people’s streets, at their front windows and in parks and gardens,” says Phil. “Instead of announcing a show that the public can book tickets for, we’re asking for people to pop on to flanagancollective.com and book a suitable slot and the whole show will be brought to them.”
Scarborough storyteller and artist Jan Bee Brown
Home entertainment of the week for children: A Bee and Lari the Seagull in Scarborough
SCARBOROUGH Museums Trust will present an online summer programme of seaside and animal-themed stories, crafts and activities, based around objects in the Scarborough Borough Collection, with the help of Lari the Seagull from July 22 to August 20.
On Wednesdays, from July 22 to August 19, families can enjoy Seaside Adventures, whether “meeting” rockpool creatures or magical selkies, all inspired by paintings at Scarborough Art Gallery and designed by storyteller and artist Jan Bee Brown.
On Thursdays, from July 23 to August 20, Animal Antics will take participants on a journey across the world, inspired by animals in the SMT natural history collections.
The highlight each week will be a new audio story written by Brown, released each Wednesday.
Lockdown disco queen Sophie Ellis-Bextor: Kitchen Disco Tour next May
Seek out the good news
YORK Racecourse’s Music Showcase Weekend with Pussycat Dolls and Rick Astley is a non-runner on July 24 and 25. Les Miserables will not mount the barricades from July 22 at Leeds Grand Theatre. However, Greg and Ails McGee’s According To McGee gallery, in Tower Street, York, will be opening its doors once more from Saturday. Sophie Ellis Bextor has announced a Kitchen Disco Tour date at Leeds Town Hall on May 19 2021; Irish chanteuse Mary Coughlan has re-arranged her Pocklington Arts Centre gig for a second time, now booked in for April 23 2021.
And what about…
THE Luminaires on BBC One on Sunday nights; can anyone shine a light on what’s going on with all that to and froing in time? New albums by Sparks, Margo Price and The Streets. The Reading Room café at Rowntree Park, York, re-opening.
Third time luck of the Irish: Mary Coughlan has re-arranged her Pocklington Arts Centre show…again
Full of Bull: York band Bull after their signing by EMI
YORK band Bull are signing to record industry giants EMI, nine years after first forming.
They become the first York group to put pen to such a deal since Shed Seven rubber-stamped a six-album contract with Polydor Records in October 1993, going on to notch up 15 Top 40 hits from Dolphin in 1994 to Why Can’t I Be You? in 2003.
Songwriter and vocalist Tom Beer, co-founder and guitarist Dan Lucas, drummer Tom Gabbatiss and bass player and print-maker Kai West will be working in tandem with EMI alongside Young Thugs: the York indie label, artist managers, recording studio and gig promoters, run by Dave Greenbrown and Jonny Hooker up the stairs at South Bank Social Club in the pioneering, underground spirit of Andy Warhol’s Factory in that other York, New York.
The first green shoots of what the EMI publicity campaign is calling “the start of a beautiful friendship” is the aptly named single Green, a crowd favourite with a history stretching back to 2012, released today.
Depending on which band member you ask, this blissful slice of jangle-pop with a pinch of psychedelia and a grating of scuzzy lead guitar is either a “melancholy rumination on decisions made and the grass always being greener”, or is all about “ripping bongs down at the basketball court when you really should be writing the next great American novel”.
“It feels surreal,” says frontman Tom Beer, breathing in the giddying fresh air of becoming a major label act. “I just didn’t really expect it, to be honest! Delighted as well…and really excited. Lucky too, as there are so many good bands out there.
“The way it worked for us was that we’d been doing a lot of gigs, touring so much, here, in the Netherlands, Germany, America, and when we released songs we had more plays because we’d played so many places.
Shed Seven: The Britpop luminaries that set the benchmark for York bands
“Young Thugs and Dave Greenbrown have been so supportive too, and then the MD [managing director] of EMI came to see us supporting Warmduscher at The Crescent.”
When? “I’m not good with dates,” says Tom. “Except in the future. I only remember them when I need to.”
Dave Greenbrown says: “We’ve been working on this for around 18 months. The MD of EMI was looking around for groups and came across Young Thugs two years ago and we’ve been trying to figure out something ever since.
“Clearly, Bull were the ones with the songs and I said to them, ‘I think there’s a chance for you if you can work on your professionalism as you have to be good every night’, and they were up for that and did exactly that.
“I didn’t want the EMI MD to see them until it was the right time, as you have only one chance, don’t you, and Bull took it.
“They write great catchy pop songs; they’ve finished the album, and they’ve signed a one-year deal with EMI: three singles, one album, just royalties off the streams and the sales of their records.”
Bull charged on to the York music scene in 2011, led by Tom and Dan, both inspired by their 1990s’ alt. rock heroes, Pavement, Yo La Tengo and The Pixies.
The present line-up of four Yorkshiremen emerged through friendship and happenstance: drummer Tom joining after he and the other Tom jammed together in bars when backpacking around Thailand; Kai making the giant leap from persistently jumping up on stage to dance in the erratic, blissful manner of Happy Mondays’ Bez to eventually being allowed to play bass.
“It feels surreal,” says Bull frontman Tom Beer. “Lucky too, as there are so many good bands out there.”
But 2011 to 2020, Tom, that is an unusually long gestation period for a band, isn’t it? “I would never not want to do this. I just can’t see myself not doing it. It’s how I operate. I’ve always busked…I’ve worked at the Golden Ball, where I put on open-mic nights on Mondays…and I’m good at living on chickpeas,” he says.
“I definitely feel that one of the best feeling you can have is playing music with another human being and I incorporate the crowd in that.”
Apparently, this is “the start of a beautiful friendship”, Tom? “I hope that’s true and I believe that to be true, because it’s always been based on friendships between us and promoters, travelling around and making it happen and it’s been rewarding.”
One such bond paid off, leading Bull indirectly to their Dutch record producer, Remko Schouten. “Whether it was blind faith or fate, we decided on a whim to go to Germany, just after Tom and Kai joined in 2018, and we were all feeling very serious about it, like when The Beatles played Hamburg,” recalls Tom.
“We were playing dive bar gigs, and we went to this bar at three in the morning, where Tom was wearing my hat, and this guy came up and said, ‘Where did you get that hat?’.
“He turned out to be the drummer – and a golfing pro! – for Spiral Stairs and Remko was there on tour with them doing their sound. We put on this house party at a friend’s house in Berlin, in Schoneberg, the area where Bowie used to live, and the next thing we know, Spiral Stairs [alias Scott Kannberg of the aforementioned Pavement] was playing at our house party!
“That night Remko said, ‘if you ever want to record with me, let me know’, and we did, two months later.”
Over the next two years, Bull visited Schouten’s Amsterdam studio four or five times, recording songs over a few days each time, songs that will now form the album whose title and release date are yet to be confirmed (although Dave Greenbrown did mention January 29 2021, so watch this space).
The artwork for Green, Bull’s first single for EMI
“This was no ‘one weekend, bash it out’ recording session,” says Dave. “This was a proper job, working over a long time.”
The Coronavirus pandemic may have brought gigs to a stultifying halt, but Bull are coping with being a band in Covid-19 times in 2020, boosted by the momentum of signing a record company deal. “It feels OK for us right now because luckily we finished the album the day before we had to flee the Netherlands, returning home instead of playing with our favourite Dutch bands in Amsterdam, but we definitely made the right decision,” says York-born Tom, who now lives in Scarborough.
Green is the first fruit of that record deal. “That song is one of the oldest Bull songs, I wrote it in 2012, and it’s the only song on the upcoming album that was featured on She Looks Like Kim, our first album in 2014, which we self-released,” says Tom.
“We recorded it at the Melrose Yard Studios, the brilliant studio off Walmgate that sadly closed last year, and we launched it with a gig at Dusk, covering the cost of the recording that night.
“Green was the first song on there and the lead single back then too, and we just thought it’s a good song, it’s always been a favourite, so let’s give it a second shot at the big time.”
The accompanying video is the work of Bull too. “We’ve worked on a lot of music videos: the one for Green is the first time I’ve ever used movie software, with the help of Dan [Lucas],” says Tom. “We had a lot of footage from various things that we could use, and there’s even some footage on there from the original Green video, made by Rory Welbrock, our bassist before Kai joined.
“It also features some latex masks made by my sister, Holly, who’s been really interested in making masks for three years – and now masks are everywhere of course, aren’t they!”
Dave Greenbrown hopes Bull’s record deal will be a trigger for more York musicians to find favour with record labels. The Howl & The Hum set the bar high with Human Contact, their late-May album for our disconcerting, disconnected times, and the likes of Bonnie & The Bailers, Fat Spatula and Perspex should be on the radar too.
Fellow York band of the moment The Howl & The Hum, featuring drummer – and former big band trumpet player – Jack Williams, left
“I think it’s been really good to be a musician in York. As a child, there were amazing music services provided for you in the city,” says Tom. “I was in a big band, playing the trombone; there were loads of people doing that, like The Howl & The Hum drummer, Jack Williams. He played trumpet.
“I think that’s had a massive impact, because you can enjoy it when you’re little, and then your musicianship progresses and you start playing in bands. For me, it was places like The Woolpack Inn [in Fawcett Street], run by a guy called Sid, who had bands on every night. It made it feel like you owned it, and if you wanted to put on a gig, you could.”
Broadening his thought, Tom says: “I’d like to thank Young Thugs for their involvement; the MD of EMI got in touch with them because he was impressed with what Young Thugs bands, such as The Lungs (Theo Mason Wood and Bonnie Milnes) and …And The Hangnails, and Bonneville, were doing.
“And now, the great thing with the link-up between EMI and Young Thugs is that hopefully it’s going to benefit other York bands too.”
What makes Bull stand out, the way a bull does when frequenting a china shop? The infectious tunes, yes, but also the humour in Tom’s Yorkshire-frank lyrics. “I’m very glad you say that,” he says. “I definitely don’t want to be any one thing in my lyrics – a lot of the time I’m capturing a temporary feeling – but a lot of my favourite songwriters embrace humour…though sometimes it doesn’t want to be too funny, just for the sake of it.
“Pavement’s Stephen Malkmus, one of my favourites, likes to use humour, and Dylan, my hero, is full of it. He plays with words a lot. It’s that thing of, if you don’t cry, you’ll laugh.”
Right now, on Green day, Bull have every reason to be smiling.
