Mondo Monthly Gigs: August 2019

Hello everyone, and welcome to a brand new monthly post here on Almost Anything Media. I’ve wanted to make a new post for a while. A monthly post that’s inclusive of the local area of York as well as its outlying and other areas of the country and showcases the talent I know there is around here. One way was to write a post about the latest singles you need to listen to, but I thought I might need to reach out to more people before that does happen. In truth, there’s nothing I enjoy more than getting right out there to meet some new people and to listen to some great music and discover bands along the way, so without further ado, I welcome the monthly post of the Mondo Monthly Gigs. This is all the recommended gigs I’m looking forward to in a particular month. Now, of course, there will be one’s I won’t always have the chance to get to but they’ll always be a few local to me around the Yorkshire and outlying areas.

Similar to the weekly Music Video countdown list, this list will compromise of ten gigs I’m sure will be a fun treat for all those involved so let’s dive straight into a local show that’s happening within the Yorkshire area.

1.Foxhaunt. The Crescent, York, 09/08/19

Support: inFade, Avenoir, Pray For Hayden

It’s a showcase of some of the best talents within York for the Alternative scene as the celebration for Foxhaunt’s latest single is being released down at one of the best venues in The Crescent. Armed with inFade, Avenoir and Pray For Hayden as their supports the Alternative outfit are sure to put on a unique night for fans of the genre.

Link To Facebook event.

Tickets cost £6.60 in advance.

 

Other Tour Dates:

August 11th 2019 – O’Riley’s, Kingston Upon Hull

Tickets for the gig at The Crescent on the 9th August are on sale now for £6 in advance.

 

2. This House Is Haunted. The Crescent, York. 16/08/19

Support: Amongst Thieves.

This House Is Haunted are a three-piece from York. Zak, Dom and Jenn blend influences from post-hardcore and metal with influences from Alexisonfire and Deftones alongside narratively styled instrumental bands such as Mew, Mogwai and Explosions In The Sky.

This House Is Haunted have the sensibilities of melodic, hooky vocals and guitar lines, with post-rock bass and drums. Often This House go in tangential directions to reveal rich sonic landscapes to crushingly heavy riffs.

With Amongst Thieves as their main support for the evening, everything is set to go off as one of the best nights for the local scene in recent memory.

Link to Facebook event.

Tickets are £6 in advance.

 

 

3. Better Days – Eiger Studios, Leeds. 23/08/19

Support: WRTHLESS, Pray For Hayden, Without Andrew.

Embarking on their first steps in their new lineup, Better Days are set to kick off a new era for the band as they embark on a mini-tour of the UK.

The band have been described as a fresh new take on pop-punk which combines all the elements of the early 2000’s era and the upcoming new breed, all eyes will be on them as they look forward to the future with brand new music in mind.

Link to Facebook event.

Tickets cost £6 in advance.

 

Other Tour Dates:

August 2019

21st – Glasgow Broadcast

22nd – Sheffield Mulberry Bar

24th – Newcastle Think Tank

 

4. Stand Atlantic. The Deaf Institute, Manchester. 28/08/19 (SOLD OUT)

Support: Royls, Superlove

The Aussie up and comers absolutely ripped through their debut UK headlining tour with their fresh and energetic ‘Skinny Dipping’ just a short insight to what goes into their shows. With a few dates set around their Reading and Leeds festival appearances, the band are set to storm across some larger stages than when they came across earlier in 2019.

Adding to this, with their now full-time bassist Miki, the Australian Pop-Pinks will come forth with a clear vision so fans will get a glimpse of just what to expect the second time around.

I was at their last UK tour for the Leeds date, their output was a little sub-par but from what I’ve heard since then, there’s going to be absolutely no stopping this band coming forward in the future.

Link to Facebook event.

SOLD OUT.

 

Other Tour Dates:

August 2019

23rd – Leeds Festival

25th – Reading Festival

26th – Brighton The Haunt

27th – Birmingham Mama Roux’s

29th – Liverpool Zanzibar

30th – Swansea Sin City

 

 

5. Frank Iero, Laura Jane Grace & The Devouring Mothers. Manchester Academy 2, 28/08/19

Support: Moving Galore

I think the only way to truly describe this lineup is Punktastic! That’s the only true adjective that does come to mind as two of the heads of the scene come together for a joint UK tour.

With festival season up and running, it seemed cruel not to mention two of the best bands, Frank Iero and the Future Violents and Laura Jane Grace and the Devouring Mothers as they’re on a mission to reclaim Manchester for their true punk heritage. Both projects have new music out and fans to devour them at the ready so everyone better be primed just for what’s going to go down on the tour.

Link to Facebook event.

Tickets cost £22.50

 

Other Tour Dates:

August 2019

26th – Glasgow St Luke’s

27th – Edingburgh Liquid Room

29th – London Scala

30th – Bristol O2 Academy

31st – Birmingham O2 Institute 2

 

6. Black Tongue. Leeds Key Club. 30/08/19

Support: Loathe, Clawhammer, Malign

I think when independent bands come down to the Key Club, it just goes off and is a little more special. I say this because when I went to see Sumo Cyco and Blood Youth, the atmosphere just transforms and elevates the show to new heights. With the metalcore troupe in Black Tongue coming across to Leeds and their EU shows in full swing, things are just going to be sweaty and rough if things are to be believed.

Link to Facebook event.

Tickets cost £12.10 (£11 Face Value).

 

 

7. The Faim. Sheffield Corporation. 31/08/19

Support: Woes, Charming Liars

Another Aussie group straight onto this list, the up and coming rockers are embarking on a lengthy UK stint in celebration of their upcoming release, ‘State Of Mind’ and it’s interesting to see what will occur on these shows coming up as you have the varying bands supporting them on their UK tour. For example with Woes, they’ve modified themselves into an experimental rock outfit but that makes them all the more enjoyable to watch and with The Faim, their transference to more Poppier sounds but with all the meaning int their lyrics shows just how much they’ll be rooted into their ways. Obviously, it’s a departure from the ‘Summer Is A Curse’ EP, but with their rhythmic sections on current singles, it shows that the crowd is going to love them all the same.

Tickets cost £13.20.

 

Other Tour Dates:

August 2019

27th – Dublin Academy 2

28th – Belfast Oh Yeah

29th – Edinburgh Sneaky Pete’s

30th – Liverpool Arts Club

31st – Sheffield Corporation

September 2019

1st – Norwich Epic Studios

 

8. Skunk Anaise. O2 Academy Leeds. 30/08/19

Support: Queen Zee

Skunk Anaise are a once in a generation band but unlike some older and well-respected bands, they’re one of the most consistent groups who are still in the scene and that’s just the only reason people still enjoy them. But it’s more than that here, as they’re continuing the experience and going further with their latest headline tour as they visit more cities following the release of their 25th anniversary live album, 25LIVE@25. As they’re hailed as one of the most exciting and greatest live acts across the globe, these shows will see the band hit a huge milestone in their career, so don’t miss out.

Link to Facebook event.

Tickets cost: £31.70

 

Other Tour Dates:

August 2019

16th – Beautiful Days Festival, Devon, UK (Headline)

17th – O2 Academy Brixton, London (SOLD OUT)

18th – Academy, Manchester (SOLD OUT)

19th – O2 Academy, Bristol (sold out)

25th – Camper Calling Festival, Warwickshire (Headline)

26th – Brighton Centre, Brighton

27th – O2 Academy, Bournemouth

28th – Corn Exchange, Cambridge

30th – O2 Academy, Leeds

31st – O2 Academy, Glasgow

SEPTEMBER

1st – O2 Academy, Newcastle

3rd – Rock City, Nottingham

4th – Cardiff University, Cardiff

 

9. Talk More. The Fulford Arms, York. 09/08/19

Support: Saytr Play, Beth McCarthy, Red Yeti

For fans of Local Natives and The Japanese House, the new outfit Talk More are heading over to The Fulford Arms in York for the release of their two brand new singles, ‘Planned Fights’ and ‘Heart Again’. With the three-piece band all collectively being involved in the scene for a while, this will be a true test to see what the band are capable of.

 

Link to Facebook event.

Tickets cost £5.

Music Video Roundup 02/08/19

It’s 4PM on a Friday! This means it’s time for the music video roundup. If you’re new to either the blog or these music video roundup posts, this is how it works. Every week, I watch some of the best recently released music videos and compile them into a list for everyone’s viewing pleasure. They’re span across all the different genres, so expect something different for most of the tracks. Up first in this weeks roundup are New Zealand based heavy metal trio ‘Alien Weaponry’. The video for ‘Blinded’ is the B-side to the ‘Ahi Ka’ 7″ single.

On the track, vocalist Lewis De Jong shared:

“The song has very personal meaning for me, but we wanted the video to leave things more open, so people can interpret it their own way. Piotr and Dwayne have really captured the notion of altered realities that we were going for, and we hope people will find their own messages in the images and the music.”

 

Next, this band wrapped up a set at this year’s 2000 Trees festival but the Danish powerhouse MØL have released a documentary-style video in a montage of footage of the band.

 

Cambridge rockers Mallory Knox are nearing the released of their self-titled fourth record this month and this is the latest offering which has followed ‘Guts’, ‘White Lies’ and ‘Black Holes’, all of which will be released onto the record.

Check out ‘Livewire’ below.

 

Heading into unfamiliar territory with this one, The Amazons have a fresh cut from their second record ‘Future Dust’ which was released earlier this year via Fiction Records, which comes ahead of their sets at this year’s Reading And Leeds Festivals later this month.

Frontman Mattew Thomson has shared:

“We fell in love with [director] Thomas James’ vision for Doubt It early on. He tapped into the themes of temptation and recklessness and applied his love and knowledge for the Horror genre to come up with something special. In a twist of fate, the video was shot in Wales, the country in which we wrote and recorded Future Dust.”

 

Heading straight into heavier territory, the legends that are Skunk Anansie have premiered their brand new video for ‘What You Do For Love’, which is the first new music in three years for the band.

It’s pulled together lots of live footage from the recent EU leg of their 25Live@25 tour.

Speaking on the track, vocalist skin shared: “People always use love as the reason to do the most heinous things to each other.”

“The hardest songs to write are political ones which is why we always try to avoid them.

“They’re supposed to just instantaneously spill out of you due to pure vexation, or they sound insincere and you fall into tired old clichés. This is one of those moments of rage! Love always seems to be the reason why people do hateful things, which I’ve never been able to understand.”

 

Up next are Post-hardcore up and comers Anemoria who’ve debuted a video for ‘Cashmere Jungle’ which is the first piece of new material following last year’s self-titled EP.

It’s uncertain whether or not the song will remain as a stand-alone single, or if it’ll feature on a yet-to-be-announced EP or Record.

 

Heading over to Bristol, the Punks known as Idles have a new animated video for ‘Never Fight With A Perm’, which is a fan-favourite taken from last years record ‘Joy As An Act Of Resistance’.

It was created by the great team at Fluffer Records who used the beat ’em up video game concept for the song’s lyrics to tackle toxic masculinity.

 

Taken from the record, ‘Barriers’, Frank Iero & The Future Violents have dropped a video for ‘Great Party’.

Starring Surfbort, the video gets weird after Frank and his band performs.

On the track, Frank has shared:

“I knew immediately when we finished writing ‘Great Party’ that it needed to be a single off the record and that we needed to make a video for that song. when I wrote the treatment for it I could see the whole thing playing out in my head, and I knew that our friends needed to be cast in it! I saw this weird gathering that you couldn’t tell if it was an AA meeting or the worlds bleakest birthday, and I knew our friend Dani from Surfbort had to be the one to light the fuse that would turn everything on it’s head. I really love this video, it may have turned out even better than I first imagined it.”

 

Heading to the heavyweights for the final videos, the band making a name for themselves are TheCityIsOurs as they have released a video for ‘Don’t Wait For Me’, a single from their upcoming record, ‘Low’.

Mikey Page (Vocals / Guitar) has shared:

“‘Don’t Wait For Me’ was written about a relationship that was incredibly toxic. We wanted to highlight the effects that relationships of this nature can have. Toxicity in these scenarios is horrible for all those involved, but there is still a general stigma that often men are at fault within these relationships or they should just ‘suck it up’ and get on with it, and even though it isn’t widely spoken about, we’re just as vulnerable… We wanted to juxtapose the lyrical message with the music, to symbolise this stigma. On the surface, this track has a feel-good vibe, but if you dig deeper, you’ll uncover something far more vulnerable.”

 

Ending on the giants known as Asking Alexandria this week and just in case you’ve been living under a rock, they have recently released the mega video for ‘The Violence’ the band’s latest single which sees a little role reversal of the zombie genre and humans are the infected and zombies are their prey.

Danny Worsnop (vocals) has shared:

“‘The Violence’ was an incredibly rewarding song to create. Ben and I both got to go way outside anything we’d done before and create something fresh and engaging. Thematically the song is about the way mainstream media and politicians manipulate and spread mistruth amongst the people to encourage and create anger, fear, division, and conflict in their quest to control and acquire power. As the history books have shown, this only goes so far before the people stand up and say enough is enough. I hope everyone enjoys what we’ve created here, we had a great time making it, and even more fun shooting the video!”

Skunk Anansie Release New Track

We haven’t heard anything from this band in roughly three years but they’re sounding as amazing as ever.

The Brit-rock masters Skunk Anansie have release, ‘What You Do For Love’.

On the track, vocalist Skin has said: “The hardest songs to write are political ones which is why we always try to avoid them,”.

The band recently released their 25LIVE@25 record, celebrating a quarter century as a band.

Check out ‘What You Do For Love’ below.

Music Video Roundup 15/02/19

Is it Friday already? That can only mean it’s 4PM and it’s time for one thing. It’s time for the music video roundup. If you’re new to either the blog or the roundup posts, this is how it works. Every week, I view some of the best recently released music videos and compile them into a list for everyone’s viewing pleasure. They’re videos that go across all the different genres, so expect something different for most of the tracks. Let’s get things going with the Hardcore Yorkshire band Blood Youth where ‘Spineless’ is about not being able to change your fucked up state of mind,” according to frontman Kaya Tarsus. Check it out below.

 

Lock & Key have returned to the spotlight after some teasing online last week and ‘Changes’ sees their first glimpse of new music since the band parted ways in 2016.

 

In the last week, The Faim haven’t seen any signs of slowing down. They’ve been on a huge UK tour, their first headlining UK tour to be exact as part of their world tour and now, they have a new Video to their Huge track, ‘Fire’. The concept behind the video, according to vocalist Josh Raven is about how dedicating yourself to achieve your dream can affect your relationships with those closest to you.

 

Moving to the Ska Punk and Punk favourites Zebrahead have gotten themselves involved with Aliens in their latest video for the track ‘We’re Not Alright’. The video sees a cloaked alien abduct and steal the brain of a human in the forest. And of course, there’s a pug.

 

Skunk Anansie have been around for the last 25 years. And to mark such an accomplishment, you have to look into the history of a band. As such, that’s exactly what this band has done perfectly for ‘Hedonism’ 25Live@5.

 

We’ve been waiting for Ocean Grove to reveal themselves for a while, and now we have some changes in the camp. Former Bassist Dale Tanner has taken over vocal duties from Luke Holmes, who left the group last month and Twiggy Hunter has stepped in on Bass.

Now, their new track, ‘Ask For The Anthem’ shows us what to expect in the future.

 

Pretty Vicious are making a strong start to make themselves known in the world. The Welsh group recently signed to Big Machine and they’re their debut record with Dan Austin on producing duties. At the moment, they’re showing just what they’re capable of in the form of their new video for “These Four Walls”.

 

For the next selection, I’ll venture into the world of alt-pop for Billie Eilish. The 17-year-old is making waves in the music world and will be releasing her debut record soon. She dropped her lead single recently, titled as “Bury a Friend” which has racked up over 30 million views on Youtube to date. I’m intrigued to hear the full record but for now, check out the video for ‘Bury a Friend’ below.

 

With Tennessee Emo / Pop Punks Free Throw just wrapping up a tour of the UK, everyone’s been wondering what’s next for the group. The answer, of course, would be their next record, titled as ‘What’s Past Is Prologue’, set to drop on March 29th via Triple Crown. For the first look at what’s to come through, is the video for ‘The Corner’s Dilemma’ which you can view below.

 

And we’ve come to the last track of this week’s Music Video countdown. I’ve reserved this sometimes for a personal favourite or one track I’ve been waiting to see for a while. Either way, you know my last choice is going to be a good one. Set It Off recently released their fourth studio record, titled as ‘Midnight’ but they did something unorthodox for their newest music video, namely, let the fans vote which they were going to make. And with that, the last video has been chosen by the fans for their new single, it’s ‘Dancing With The Devil, which sees the band confined in quarantine. That’s all I’m revealing for it. You have to watch it, to see how good it is.

And that’s it for another week of music video roundups. Be sure to check back next week for another ten of the best right here at Almost Anything Media.

Skunk Anansie Announces Three New Shows

It’s been a while since I’ve heard anything from this bands camp as of late.

Skunk Anansie have announced three UK shows to celebrate their 25th anniversary as a band.

The band’s milestone is also marked by the release of the live record, 25LIVE@25.

Here are the dates for the tour.

August 2019

16th – Beautiful Days Festival, Devon

17th – O2 Academy Brixton, London

18th – Manchester Academy

19th Bristol O2 Academy