Cardiff‚Äôs music mafia

Napoleon Solo puts his life on the line for you to get all the info on two of Cardiff’s underground gig promoters...

By Napoleon Solo

To all intents and purposes music is an art form, and as with film, literature, photography and the like, a fair amount of personal exploration is required in order for it to provide you, the supposed art lover, with the most enriching experience.

Music is also big business and it would seem that in this day and age, art of a genuinely high quality created to challenge our idle little brains and big business do not mix well.

There is a temptation, that is not altogether unreasonable, for creators of music to satisfy demand, sell some records, make some cash and be happy as Larry (whoever he is).

It’s not all like this though. There are enough interesting people in the world who produce a wealth of weird, wonderful, untapped music, and plenty of people fighting against the odds to get it heard alongside the corporate juggernaut that is the music industry.

In our very own Cardiff there are people who dedicate a portion of their lives to this cause and a small, growing community is developing in the Cardiff ‘underground’ who are doing their best to get new and interesting music from all over the world played whenever possible.

Good people, doing a good thing, for a good cause. Good.

My Kung Fu

My Kung Fu is a small record label created by ex-Cardiff University students John Rostron and Carl Morris (both pictured) after meeting in the Cathays based ‘Twat Bar’, now the Italian Restaurant Amalfi, and chewing the cud about damn good records. Two years on (almost exactly, keep your eyes peeled for a birthday bash) and it boasts a homely office in the Coal Exchange and a gig promoting arm: Forecast.

Created, nurtured and tenderly loved by the third member (also called Carl) in the MKF mixer, Forecast was born from the aforementioned life-giver’s annoyance at the crap music that was ‘more about being hip than taking risks,’ bandying about in Cardiff.

A year on and they can boast Devendra Banhart, the Go! Team and the upcoming Mogwai gig at the Coal Exchange as their own, but more than these relatively big shows, Forecast offer an opportunity, as John says, “Not go to the Union‚Ķ get to know your town, go to somewhere you’ve never fucking been, go and see a band you’ve never fucking seen.” Live a little, as they say.

Their shows are not your average shows either, whether it be a buffet at Canton Labour Club to accompany Euros Childs, or the Hawk And A Hacksaw’s leader playing an accordion, a gong, two cymbals and a bass drum by himself as well as singing and wearing a hat with bells on. Keeping people interested and not letting it go stale are on the agenda. Do something a little bit different to stand out from the beige. Fuck the beige, no-one likes beige.

They can’t do all this on their own mind and a co-operative venue or loads can create a ‘you scratch my back‚Ķ’ styley community, and everyone’s a winner. The Buffalo Bar for example (“The best thing to happen to Cardiff in ages”), Clwb Ifor Bach, The Point and The Coal Exchange – all good people, offering a helping hand and trying as best they can to keep prices down. Not the Barfly though, oh no, but more about that later.

People like this are what we need, it’s what I need, they make everything better. They make having a bad day okay because at least I’m going to see a weird band that no-one has ever heard of, and unless they’re really, really shit I’ll enjoy it. One is adding to a repertoire, challenging one’s self, relishing in the personal exploration; shows like these cannot fail to create a conversation starter, none of this ‘they played everything I expected,’ or ‘they did that at their last show’.

Think about it, music is their lives, in these people you can trust. Even if you hated it, at least you know. Hate is an underrated emotion anyway.

Forecast

The screaming counterpoint to Forecast’s dulcet tones, Lesson No. 1 have been tearing Cardiff apart from the inside for nigh on two years now. Noel, Adam and Louis have brought destructive noise raining down on Cardiff’s seedy underbelly and it would appear that some of it has stuck, gestated and grown into a bubbling subculture of Cardiff’s coolest. This is Lesson No. 1, and a fucking good lesson it is too.

L#1 began under the banner of Plan B magazine (Everett True’s excellent vessel arisen from the embers of Careless Talk Costs Lives) putting on ‘different’ gigs across Cardiff’s many and varied venues. They even found venues where the less adventurous amongst you may have thought there were none (Newport’s Le Pub and upstairs at Dempsey’s for a start).

It was only natural that they become their own entity, with no more specific an aim than to carry on doing the stuff they’d been doing, with more good bands giving more people a chance to see more music they would never normally get a chance to see, and to discover this bizarre subculture they might never have thought existed. It would seem that people like it too: “I’m pressed to remember too many flop shows we’ve had, and the fact we keep seeing the same faces coming back reflects that,” said Louis, one third of this illustrious team.

Inspired by Rhode Island label Load Records and its dedication to all things visceral, cheap and exciting, they have brought us some of the world’s weirdest and most wonderful acts. From Italian-freejazz-spazcore three piece Zu to Brighton-based happy-hardcore nutcase DJ Shitmat, via many different stops along the way. These three gents have been busy building brilliant bills and creating a community Cardiff can be proud of.

The hub of Lesson No. 1 these days is their blog, where you can find details of all upcoming shows along with information about most of the bands and an archive of all past events. It is obsessively maintained with links to bandsites, messageboards, labels and more, and states beneath the title that they have been ‘proudly functioning without a fucking Myspace account since 2004.’ How devilishly counter-culture and punk-rock.

Fuck the Barfly, they don’t even know; they think they know, but they don’t EVEN know. This is about Dempsey’s, Le Pub, Clwb, The Point, The Toucan (RIP), Buffalo Bar, the Coal Exchange‚Ķ and so on. This is about learning, not money; about passion, not commerce. This is about you. This is about thrusting magnificent music your way and not even charging you for the pleasure (well, not a lot, anyway).