MUSIC NEWS EXTRA
Dirty Revolution
BBC Wales’ Horizons enterprise scheme,
launched by DJ Bethan Elfyn earlier this
year with the aim of giving a promotional
push to 12 Welsh acts on a monthly basis,
is to be supplemented with an extra
funding scheme. Titled Launchpad, it
will be offering awards of up to £2,000
to bands or artists who apply – that is
to say, it’s not intended to bankroll a
career, rather be put towards the costs
of something like a van (Elfyn’s chosen
example). The stipulations for applying:
you must be based in Wales, play your own
stuff, have been played on Radio Wales
or Radio Cymru, and enter by Mon 3 Nov.
More at www.bbc.co.uk/horizons
While crowdfunding becomes more
widely used at all levels of the music
industry, the public disgruntlement with
the continuing existence of the loathed
‘booking fee’ remains steady. In Cardiff,
meanwhile, a new booking platform
is being developed which addresses
both these factors, likewise people’s
increasing desire to know exactly how
their money is being spent. Tocyn (tocyn.
launchrock.com) is an online box office
which allows consumers to donate their
booking fees to local arts charities and
community projects. Birthed with the
help of Community Music Wales and
free fundraising platform Zequs, it’s not
operational yet, but is keen to hear from
organisations who might either sell on it,
or reap its charitable benefits
Cardiff sextet Dirty Revolution have
taken their extremely jaunty, pointedly
political ska-punk sound far and wide
in the last few years, releasing two
albums and becoming much loved among
Europe’s skanking community. As of this
month, they’ll be breaking up, signing off
with a final gig in Cardiff’s Moon Club on
Halloween. The split, announced back in
June, is amicable and indeed reluctant:
DR vocalist Reb is mother to a two-yearold, and – for now at least – has elected
to concentrate on this rather than the
band’s tireless touring schedule. There’ll
also be a four-song EP, Burn After
Listening, available to pre-order now
The Coal Exchange, an iconic landmark
of Cardiff Bay and fondly recalled in its
latter-day capacity as a music venue,
has been closed since May last year due
to its innards being structurally unsound.
Developers’ plans to purchase it and turn
it into flats suggested its days as a vessel
for the arts were irrefutably numbered.
However, in September its owners GYG
Exchange Ltd went into liquidation, citing
the cost of owning and maintaining the
building. Its future thus in limbo, there’s
already been talk of returning it to its
former status, with Labour MP for Cardiff
South Stephen Doughty forming an ‘action
group’ dedicated to this
In spite of being a singular and acclaimed
Welsh folk talent, both solo and as a
member of the band Fernhill, Julie Murphy
evidently does not feel pressured to churn
out product. A full decade separates her
second solo album, Lilac Tree, and its
followup, 2012’s A Quiet House. However,
Murphy recently announced a new solo
full-length, due to be released in 2015.
Interest levels will be done no harm by her
presence high in the UK album charts of
late, as a guest vocalist on Robert Plant’s
new Lullaby And... The Ceaseless Roar.
Percy enlisted Murphy to interpolate an
ancient Welsh ballad on the track Embrace
Another Fall
ONE TO WATCH...
HMS MORRIS
HMS Morris, the solo project of Heledd Watkins turned curio-pop threepiece, came into being in 2013 but have only properly hit the ground
running this year. This year also marks the centenary of HMS Morris,
a WWI British war ship. Beyond their name, and their having titled a
(digital-only) single from earlier this year Shipping Forecast, there is
little that obviously connects the Cardiff-based trio to nautical matters,
let alone ones of devastating conflict. As it turns out, HMS Morris’
agreeably inexact take on synthpop, psychedelia and indiepop probably
serves them better than if they were playing sea shanties, or were a military brass band.
Having played in a short-lived Cardiff band called Bare Left circa 2009, Watkins moved to London and scored some acting and
session musician gigs, notably becoming bassist in Emmy The Great. Now relocated to Cardiff, she’s joined in HMS Morris by
Sam Roberts (bass/synth) and Wil Roberts (drums), both of whom used to play in Mwsog.
This new venture allows them to continue combining electronic and pastoral moods, as showcased on a new two-track single released
by north Wales label Blinc. I Grind My Teeth starts off with a deceptively cheap drum machine, quickly swelling into an earworm pop
number that recalls Catatonia and The Postal Service in equal measure. I Dream Of The Diner breaks out the creepy garage or