Monday 29 December 2008

Scenester Scene #1

I'm been wondering about how to map the music scene for a while now, its been lurking at the back of my head for month, only bubbling to the forefront on talking to muso-types. But it finally formed a shape in ma heid last night, driving home in a flu-conceived delerium.

The invocation of Venn

Any band can get their own gig, but its the promoters who make the scene, promoters putting on bands who've already passed the hurdle of convincing another person to put them on. 'Music scene' is very subjective, but for me it means the gigs I go to. For someone else its means the gigs they go to. Back in Glasgow it would be The Winchester Club, Drive Carefully Records and Pin Up Nights, but here in London I habitually go to Twee As Fuck and Lost Music, with occasional ventures to White Heat, Goonite, HDIF and a few others.

These promoters are pretty good a picking bands that I enjoy seeing, and occasionally different promoters have the same bands playing, its like a stamp of quality for the bands.

By my reckoning Twee As Fuck have had 60 different bands playing and Lost Music have had 72, the two overlapping by 12 bands.

scene01

Bands who've played both Twee As Fuck and Lost Music (12 of them)
Hong Kong in the 60s
Little My
Mexican Kids At Home
Mono Taxi
Pocketbooks
St Christopher
Stars of Aviation
Still Corners
The Hermit Crabs
The Just Joans
The Pains of being pure at heart
The School

Bands who've played Twee As Fuck and not Lost Music (48 of them)
A Classic Education
A Smile and A Ribbon
Afternoon Naps
Bears
Bearsuit
Betty and the Werewolves
Bricolage
Comet Gain
Connan and Moccasins
Esiotrot
Fanfarlo
Hands on Heads
Hatcham Social
Hotpants Romance
Iguana Nights
Ipso Facto
Je Suis Animal
King and the Olive Fields
Liestenstein
Lis-Bonne
Little Things
Love is all
Monade
My Sad Captains
Peter Parker
Sexy Kids
Shragg
Strange Idols
The Bobby McGees
The Bridal Shop
The Chiara Ls
The Crisps
The Duloks
The Felt Tips
The Inconsolables
The Mai 68s
The Mare
The Margarets
The Noughts and Crosses Band
The Voluntary Butler Scheme
The Wave Pictures
The Winter Club
Theoretical Girl
Tom Hatred and the Angry Band
Vic Godard and Subway Sect
Wake the President
Would-be-goods
Zoey Van Goey

Bands who've played Lost Music and not Twee As Fuck (60 of them)
Air Formation
Autocolt
Champion Kickboxer
Charlie Don't Surf
Daniel Benjamin
Downdime
Dyrain
Falling out of cars
Havana Guns
Horowitz
Indurain
Irene
Jesus Licks
Model Morning
Molloy
Mr Solo
Nat Johnson
Navvy
Pete Green
Phil Wilson
Plans and Apologies
Radio Luxembourg
Santa Dog
Sarandon
Secret Shine
Silver Springs
Slow Down Tallahassee
Smokers Die Younger
Sparkys Magic Piano
Strawberry Story
Swimsuit Issue
Tall Poppies
The All New Adventures of Us
The Argonauts
The Arndales
The Candy Twins
The Cut Outs
The Darlings
The Delanies
The Electric Pop Group
The Fischers
The Gresham Flyers
The Hillfields
The J-Pegs
The Keith John Adams
The Kick Inside
The Lieutenants Mistress
The Lodger
The Loves
The Manhattan Love Suicides
The Night Jars
The Postcards
The Puncture Repair Kit
The Sailplanes
The Scaremongers
The Social Services
The Trudy
The Understudies
Their Hearts were full of Spring
Time. Space. Repeat

You can view all the raw(ish) data here on Googledocs
Well, this wee data analysis has been fun and informative, I'm sure you'll agree. Hasn't really helped me on the job front, and now this flu has my eyes streaming as well as my nose. There's no hope for me.

Other promotions I need to parse in the future
Fortuna Pop (done)
Spiral Scratch (done)
Offbeat
HDIF
Guided Missile
White Heat

If there's any bands I've missed or promoters I've forgotten, let me know. I see this one rolling and rolling

2 comments:

  1. Chris do you realise your diagram looks - from a distance - like a pair of gonads?

    More constructively, I'm coming to London to DJ at the Buttoned Down Disco on the 2nd Saturday of Janaury and I'm wondering if you know of anywhere that might let me have a crack at DJing on the Friday night? Have e mailed McGee to ask if I can have a go at his "the queen is dead" night at the borderline but the scoundrel hasn't replied...

    D.

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  2. Being a Bristol boy now (ex London) I rather like Santa Dog...

    And, more to the point, the sadly missed Bristol Venn Festival, which was one of the most creative music scenes anywhere, ever...

    Have a look at http://www.myspace.com/vennfestival

    or http://www.vennfestival.com/

    Nature abhors a vacuum... it's only a matter of time ...

    ReplyDelete