Evening mini festival at Somerset House

From Aloe Blacc 2011

It was relatively early start at Somerset House as a number of new acts got the chance to experience playing the wonderful venue as part of the What Next programme – if Debbie Aramide, Franklin Secret and Ruby Blue are examples of what London can produce, without a formulaic TV talent show in sight, then the music industry has a great future.

Listed as the first “main” support act Yasmin continued the great live music. Her confident performance of Finish Line was the highlight of the set.

Dionne Bromfield, at 16, could easily have been one of the acts performing as part of What Next – but she easily justified her position as top support act. Filling the venue with a sound that belied her young age – she didn’t need the support of her four dancers to put on a good show – the sound alone did that – but if they helped added to her confidence they didn’t distract from the quality of  the set. She will surely emerge from the shadow of her god mother, Amy Winehouse, and become a star in her own right…

The smooth Aloe Blacc then took to the stage – his polished mix of Soul, Jazz and R&B with a little rap/hip hop mixed in filled the Somerset House court yard on what had become a warm summer evening.

The addition of 3 sets from What Next extended the evening in to almost a mini festival – the wonderful Summers Sunday afternoon weather contributed – would be nice if Somerset House decided to extend this to all their weekend gigs in the Summer Series. 

Outer Hebrides to the centre of London?

The first of my “lucky dips” of the Somerset House Summer series was Stonoway – the audience waiting for them varied from the very young to middle aged, and was a good indicator of the middle of the road performance they would give. The warm summer evening had a mellow expectant audience awaiting the musicians. Starting slowly – apparently a little overwhelmed by the venue it took time for the quartet to engage the audience. Adding the North Sea Radio Orchestra to the sound was an interesting experiment to add texture and breadth to their sound – but the introduction simply disrupted the little momentum the band had managed to build. They did succeed in building to a crescendo with their with Long Distance Lullaby and Zorbing.   I’d suggest that the open air grandeur didn’t do their sound any favours and they’ll restrict themselves to smaller indoor venues like the one in Eastleigh they referred to playing the previous night – a Georgian courtyard being one step towards the big time for the time being… An enjoyable random way to spend a summer evening in the centre of London – but not quite up to the high level previously attained by performers on this stage…

From Stornoway 2011

Green within the Courtyard

From Professor Green 2011

The first Friday of the Summer Series at Somerset House and I made sure I was there as early as I could. I wasn't expecting a N-Dubz style turn out, most of the audience queuing many hours before the doors opened – but even so the queue was substantial, over an hour before the doors where due to open. Ed Drewett warmed up an already packed courtyard, by the time Professor Green’s set began the audience where already energized and ready to dance for the rest of the night. The sound could have done with a little more vocal to be able to hear the clever use of words and rhythm that have brought me round to rap as an art form.   Covers of tracks by artists including Beyonce Kowles and Jay-Z, interleaved between material from his upcoming album and well know hits, where the highlights of evening. Professor Green was clearly enjoying himself as much as the audience and defying the Evening Standards description of him as a “cartoon rapper” or Lily Allen collaborator.

No conga in sight as Summer Series returns

Having enjoyed all but one night of the musical lucky dip that is the Summer Series at Somerset House in 2010, I'd secured tickets for every night in 2011 without having to depend on re-sales sites.

The headline act for the first night was eels - but it was some of the supporting acts that had been equally good discoveries in 2010 and sometimes strange oddities... The first support act feel in to the latter category - hula hop to DJ. Jesca Hoop was a more traditional, if still experimental, jazz/pop set – her song about talking her dying Mormon mother thought smoking a joint stood out!

From eels 2011

It is a shame Somerset House couldn't have opened their series with a British act - I'm sure there are many that would have jumped at the chance of playing such a wonderful venue – having said that eels has certainly attracted a enthusiastic sold out crowd. Beards, preferably full, appeared to be required to be on stage. It took a little while for the audience to warm up – but once we’d got to the very appropriate Hot Fun in the Summertime and then Novocaine for the Soul the gig was in full swing – Mark Everett agreed it was “marvellous”. I don’t think the second encore of the night was planned – and if not it’s refreshing for the band to have been free to respond to the applause from the audience spontaneously. But, it might have just been they needed two breaks to get to the end of their mammoth 26-song set! A good start to the run of live music.

Flight South

It is Autumn in London – so it must be time for me to escape for a short period to warmer climbs – this time, what a I hope will be a bi-annual event – a fly away Grand Prix, the Brazilian Grand Prix in Sao Paulo, in contrast to my last trip to the Singapore Grand Prix, I’ve splashed out on expensive hospitality tickets, gaining access to a pit lane visit and a covered seat – history would suggest the race is just as likely to be wet as dry – which will add to the spice, especially as the championship is still very much alive, with 5 drivers still with a mathematical chance…

Yet again I prelude the GP city with another great city of the world – last time it was Hong Kong – this time the 26th largest city in the world – Rio de Janeiro.

A very uneventful journey by Black cab, Heathrow Express, Airport Bus , (that was a bit of a pain – what is the point of T5 if you still have to get a bus?) and 11 hours in the comfort of Business class found me in Galeão Airport – the hotel estimated the remaining journey time to be 45 minutes – I wasn’t surprised to in fact arrive at the hotel in under 20, given the rapid lane changing journey across Rio to the haven of the Rio InterContinental