music live
TREDFEST Venue 1, Tredegar Sat 30 Apr
This rock-ish alldayer has the laudable aim of bringing live music to Tredegar, a Blaenau Gwent burgh described on Tredfest’s own website as “a small town with high levels of deprivation”. Moreover, it’s been lacking an actual gig venue for over 30 years, though in one form or other has had Tredfest since 2010.
This year’s lineup, their first since 2018, takes place in Venue 1 – a former chapel that looks rather prim from the outside, but if it’s a home fit for a church mouse in the week, then this Saturday should see much of the bill shaking bats from the belfry.
Headliners Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs were in Wales (and on this page last ovember, ahead of a most enjoyable show in Swansea venue Sin City, and are making a road warrior of a journey from Newcastle and back just for this. For this writer’s money Tredfest’s
most bankable booking yet, their combo of psychedelia, noiserock and Black Sabbath is delivered with high wattage and good cheer.
Joining them among a nine-act bill are Saint Agnes, a London band centred on the duo of Kitty Austen and Jon Tufnell; Bristol’s Wych Elm, who combine moody 90s alt riffs and a sort of Children Of The Corn image; and CLT DRP, a punky electro three-piece from Brighton with a terrible name. There are also emergent south Walians including Panic Shack (whose debut EP is glowingly reviewed over the page, nonsensical funkers Pigeon Wigs, glam wildcats Telgate and the suitably fuzzy Clwb Fuzz, plus the rather more venerable lo-fi oddity of John Mouse.
Tickets: £20 Info:
tredfest.co.uk NOEL GARDNER
BAD BOY CHILLER CREW Venue Cymru, Llandudno, Sat 16 Apr
Great Hall, Cardiff University Students Union, Fri 29 Apr
Bradford MC/production trio Bad Boy hiller rew are the first legit breakout stars of bassline house, which has been massive in Yorkshire since the mid-2000s. Inclusive and populist as you could wish for, it still feels curious that it’s BBCC – Gareth Kelly, Sam Robinson and Kane Welsh – who’ve had this sort of success, touring their lairy, pneumatic sound to parts of the U you’d be unlikely to find actual bassline nights.
They first garnered attention by posting prank videos to Facebook, capitalising on this via multiple nightclub and festival appearances. Their debut mixtape, 2020’s Full Wack No Brakes, filled in nicely while this was off the table, and this has just been followed up by Disrespectful, 20 tracks of skits, familiar house samples and raps about the intricacies of the BBCC lifestyle. Mid-album cut Take It is MCed by underrated Cardiff grime head Local, so expect to see him appearing at his fully subscribed hometown show on Fri 29.
Tickets: at / ri
sold ot. Info:
venuecymru.co.uk /
cardiffstudents.com NOEL GARDNER
38
ELAINE MITCHENER +
MAGGIE NICOLS Tangled Parrot, Swansea Wed 6 Apr
The third live event booked by Rhodri Davies, under his promotional title Nawr, during March and April is another highly commendable coup, demonstrating that he’s constructing an experimental music scene in the city out of almost nothing. Edinburgh-born vocalist Maggie Nicols is actually resident not too far away, Dre-fach Felindre in Carmarthenshire, though her work in the field of a and free improvisation since the late 1960s has taken her to a vast and varied number of nations and pursuits.
Londoner Elaine Mitchener, like Nicols, is a improvising vocalist and prolific collaborator: notable recent examples include Moor Mother’s Black Encyclopedia Of The Air and an album by jazz duo Black Top, who Nawr booked in March. By the same token,
praised for her own performance concepts, which incorporate visual art and choreography as well as her own Black British perspective. Add an opening set by Swansea’s Syd Howells and this seven quid gig would be a bargain at twice the price.
she’s been
Tickets: . Info:
rwan.cymru
NOEL GARDNER
MIKE DUNN Story, Cardiff Sun 17 Apr
Alright! Here’s a club night that looks tasty enough to pop in here, by virtue of giving a dance music pioneer his Welsh debut instead of just booking the same old names over and over. Fair enough, Mike Dunn is not strictly speaking at the cutting edge of the 2022 scene, but fire up his hits from debut Dance You Mutha onwards to confirm this stuff – charting the mutation of house into acid into techno, specifically in the clubs of his Chicago home – still sounds exceedingly fresh.
He’s never really stopped in the preceding 35 years, either, going in a more soulful vocal house direction after the acid boom but returning to his raw, jack trax roots in the last decade via collabs with younger producers Alden Tyrell and Murphy Jax.
This bank holiday spesh is promoted by Cardiff stalwarts Lamerica, who’ve been hosting daytime events on Story’s rooftop, although this one’s in the club’s basement, which feels more appropriate for this sound.
Tickets: .. Info:
lamerica.eventcube.io
NOEL GARDNER
SISTER COOKIE Acapela, Cardiff Wed 4 May
Sister Cookie has been a known quantity since about the mid- 00s in a close-knit but not fully definable London scene that encompasses retro bluessouljazzers a la Winehouse, valve-amp garage rockers such as you might find at the Toe Rag recording studio, and the sort of afternoon-slot festival funk beloved of Craig Charles and other 6 Music DJs.
harles is indeed a confirmed fan of this big-voiced vocalist, who originally traded as Miss Cookie and is debuting in Cardiff as part of a tour to promote her first album, In The Blue Corner. Perhaps with her sound’s broadly vintage sound in mind, the album has actually been out since November of last year, but you’ll have had to buy the vinyl to hear it.
five-strong selection from it, Ain’t No Good, is however streaming now, and demonstrates Cookie and band’s skill for sultry, sax-heavy R&B vamping, with a bit of highlife and Afrofunk cribbed from her Nigerian parents’ record collection.
Tickets: . Info:
acapela.co.uk
NOEL GARDNER
Frank Fieber
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