Guest Blogs

GUEST COLUMN – Steve Rastin – Back To Blu …And Beyond?

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As a town Rhyl may not have a great reputation on the whole, but it has nonetheless been home to a number of much loved live music venues over the years.
After the late, lamented Bistro closed its doors we had the Breeding Ground, still generally regarded as the absolute gold standard in the town, and this has been followed down the years by the likes of the Dudley Arms, Vegas and The Pot, until we reached The North and O’Gradys – immediately prior to lockdown.More

GUEST COLUMN – James Phillips – Hurrah For Lockdown?

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Hurrah for Lockdown?

I’m joking right? While we’re all mourning the loss and, according to some commentators, the death of live music, what have we got to celebrate?

Firstly, whatever Facebook might like to think, we’re all still out here and, with the ubiquity of digital equipment, we all have an opportunity to spread our music about online and to find and enjoy the stuff that others are still sharing. No, of course it isn’t the same as a gig. You will miss the chance to pay too much for bad lager (obviously does not apply to the Skerries) while someone heavy dances on your toes, a six foot ten monster blocks your view of the singer and a cloth eared soundman does his best to give you terminal tinnitus. These things are irreplaceable and are part of what makes gigs fantastically exciting, but at least you can still get a fix of fresh new music.

Secondly, there are still ample opportunities to support the acts you love. Most of them have an online outlet like Bandcamp where you can buy their music. Some of them even have proper merchandise. You get to look swish in a questionable t-shirt (where is Betws Garmon again?) or at least keep warm, while helping your favourites to keep their heads above water.

Thirdly, I am producing the most varied and experimental music that I have in decades. One reason is that there is no prospect of playing any of this stuff live in the near future, so I don’t have to worry about whether it’s feasible to reproduce any of it on stage. Another is that I have much more time while I’m locked up at home avoiding all you plague bearers, to actually sit back and try new and interesting stuff.

Fourthly, and talking of trying new stuff, lockdown is a chance to branch out. Practice that guitar riff that you could never play, or even attempt to play. You won’t have to produce it on stage for a while yet, so you’ve got a chance to take your time and really nail it down. I have already taken this a step further, by expanding my collection of odd instruments that I can play a little bit. My future recordings may well feature an alpine horn, and that, if nothing else, should prompt you to say “Hurrah for Lockdown.”

James P M Phillips on Bandcamp

COLUMN – Neil Crud – No More Gigs

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Talk about lifestyle changes eh? The Martial Law lockdown has taken out everything our small circle of misfits loved doing… Live music… It got so bad at one point that I would have even gone to see a Guns ‘n’ Roses Tribute band – the two things I probably hate most… Guns ‘n’ Roses and tribute acts…
Back in March, which now seems like a lifetime ago, Spam Javelin played with Gas Hands at The Millbank in Rhyl… It was a weird evening, Lockdown was days away and people were already going into self-isolation… It was a Wednesday night and that fateful Liverpool vs Atletico Madrid footy match was on the TV. Two days later Maines pulled out of a gig in Chester stating Corona-concerns, Emissaries Of Syn played it (they’re a biohazard anyway) and it turned out to be one of the very last gigs in the country (and very last major football game)… By Tuesday our great leader had announced a countrywide lockdown and we entered the unknown…

“Sing brother sing, there’ll be no more gigs…” – those words by Dick Lucus of Subhumans off their 1982 album ‘The Day The Country Died’ have certainly come true. 

People are thankfully resourceful, and early on we saw some great Lockdown sets on Facebook Live from both Rash Decision and Burning Flag… and some terrible acoustic sets from others (ha ha). With smaller community radio stations deciding to close due to restrictions we saw shows like my own on TudnoFM and Liam Trotsky’s, broadcast on Facebook Live, from our living rooms. This was OK until the fascists at Facebook started taking the shows off air for playing copyrighted material. So again we became resourceful, I moved to Mixcloud Live and Paul Hammond moved to Live Sets, others used YouTube live. I have been back in the TudnoFM studios for a good six weeks now (one of only three DJs there doing so); unfortunately I’ve not been able to host any live sessions for obvious reasons, but again, I need to be resourceful… [watch this space].

The other way to get our kicks and support bands, unable to play live is to buy their music – all the money I have saved on not going to gigs (or playing them) I have, by and large spent on vinyl… Maybe you could do so too. You could even venture beyond your front door and help support the likes of Mudshark Records in Bangor, or Vod Music in Mold.

Music might be widely available and free to download or stream, but it’s not free to produce…

(*check out the new column from The Barefoot Rascal)

GUEST COLUMN – The Barefoot Rascal – Where Have All the Punks Gone?

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As I thought about this debut piece for link2wales I got thinking about the last live gig I attended, it was just a small punk show with only two bands and not many more coming to watch. One band are a well-known local band, whilst the other was a touring band who had been good enough to stop off in North Wales.
Maybe it was the live European Champions League football on TV that kept people at home, maybe it was the midweek night instead of on a weekend, maybe it was the fact there were only two bands, maybe it was the over-proliferation of local gigs?
I honestly don’t know. I do think that there are too many gigs for such a small fanbase. Gigs should always be quality over quantity. I’d rather wait a month or longer between gigs and have it as a proper event than have one or two every week in front of an increasingly small crowd. The Golden Goose has been well and truly throttled and stuffed.

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BLOG RHYS MWYN – Listen To This ! The Importance Of Culture

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[orig published in Herald Cymraeg 25 March 2020]

It’s almost impossible to know what to write this week. We face a period of uncertainty beyond any experience in our lives. As the situation and circumstances with the Coronavirus change from day to day and I write at weekends and the column is published on Wednesday, it is difficult to know how much has changed in the meantime. The only thing that is certain is the uncertainty.

It is quite obvious that so many of us in Wales are freelance, small business and self-employed. And a large number of us then within the creative and cultural sectors. Things will be hard. Much of my work and salary is lecturing, guided tours and related archaeology work. So far everything in April and May has been postponed. It may be possible to rearrange some things but much of the work will have been lost.More

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