Northeast Music Guide

Two Local Rock Bands Earn The Right  to Play Bloodstock Festival Over the last few months local rock and metal bands have been competing in the Metal 2 The Masses “battle of the bands” style heats at Newcastle’s Trillians Rock Bar. Last weekend the final was hosted at The Cluny and not one but two bands were chosen to play Bloodstock. They will be joining legendary local black metal innovators Venom at the festival making it a hat-trick of northeast bands entertaining people from all over the world. Bloodstock is the largest independent heavy metal festival in the UK with up to 15,000 attendees. The festival started in 2005 with only 700 people, an example of careful but ambitious growth. The size of the crowd at the Cluny reflected the enthusiasm for metal that seems to be experienced a rebirth in the Northeast. The overall winner of the final, chosen by Bloodstock’s Simon Hall, was The Souls of Jack Ketch: angy brutal metal with fearsome vocals and yet a really friendly...

Keeping British Blues Alive For a band, after 4 decades to be able to comfortably fill the Cluny with fans, you have to have a quality live product. Nine Below Zero have been delivering this quality since they reformed for their 10 th anniversary in 1990. The crowd clearly loved the band and Dennis Greaves (lead vocals, guitar) provided much cockney banter to fill the gaps between the perfectly-performed blues numbers. It’s amazing (to a novice like me) that a band can manage to have such a diverse repertoire while still working within the Anglo-American blues style. No plodding blues, everything coloured with the individual talents of the band members. They stormed through such numbers as “Can I Get A Witness”, “Homework” and “Got my Mojo Working” with such enthusiasm, you wonder how they keep it going after so many years, and miles of touring. Mark Feltham, a very much in-demand master of the harmonica played a blinder of a gig tonight. How he made the sounds he ...

London blues-influenced band Nine Below Zero fresh from another successful tour of Europe and a string of dates along the south coast of England head north to play the Arc in Stockton-On-Tees on Friday May 17 and the Cluny in Newcastle on Saturday May 18. Nine Below Zero built an almost obsessive following in the early 1980 with their take on American blues, while maintaining the energy of punk in their live performances. It was captured in their first album, Live At The Marquee, which was re-released towards the end of 2012. Frontman and founding member Dennis Greaves said: “We decided to put it out again after Universal found some film from the night that we didn’t know still existed. They also found the encores we did, which were not on the original album. In those days, you couldn’t get much more than about 50 minutes on a album. So this will be of great interest to our fans.” Nine Below’s success continued to build during the 1980s. They performed their single 11+1...

Entropy, yes that sums it up really  A change to the lineup due to unforeseen circumstances was not going to put a dampener on the evening's proceedings. The gig, put on by "Confusion is Next" promotions, or Linsey Teggert, was bigged up by the NME as definitely a gig to go to. It was also plugged by the Jowheretogo Show on NE1fm, I know this, because I am she who presents the show and played Dingus Khan's "Knifey Spooney" in the hope a few listeners would be inspired as I was, to go to the gig. The venue, Heart Attack and Vine, is perfect for a small gig, at it appears, minimal expense. A room for about 70 people, 2 loos, nicely rectangular so you can set up your stage at one end (of the room not the bogs). There is no bar, not even a cool box full of pop, so you need to bring your own or use the Cluny for refreshment. Set up to look a bit homely, using, paint, drapes, pictures and standard lamps. Spot on compared to some pubs with their odd-shaped room...